Please

Look at your hands. Manicure lately? If you have a mirror, take a glance. You are probably looking at combed, perhaps even styled hair (or at least hair with that potential, if you managed to get out of your pajamas yet). You may be at work, reading this undercover, or at home while dinner is cooking, or maybe at a coffee shop while you are waiting for your own inspiration to hit. Whatever, you are nice and comfy in a chair, protected from the sun, probably well fed, and (again if you managed to get out of your jammies), wearing clean, neat clothing.

There is usually a dull roar rushing in my ears when I am New York City. I tend to tune out the sounds and smells, and focus on the sights before me, and so I don't hear the traffic or screaming. I don't smell the piss, though I do see the people lying in the doorways and on the warm vents rising from the subway. Today, while there was no one NEEDING to lie on a warm vent, I did hear something as I strode forcibly across town...I had brushed past a man wearing a sandwich board, handing out flyers, as usual. I just don't care to take the flyers...I won't use them and I hate to waste the paper...but as I passed, I heard him say "please," softly, to the person behind me. There was something urgent in his voice that made me turn around....and actually glance at him and he said it again as the woman stopped to see what he had. I walked on, but then for some reason, I felt compelled to turn around. I walked back towards the corner and watched him for a few minutes.

His job is to stand on the corner of 46th and 6th Avenue and hand out flyers for a nail salon. 99.9% of the people who pass, like me, ignore him, or avoid him. No one looks at him, and I am sure most are annoyed when he gets in their way on the sidewalk.

So I watched him for a few minutes. I watched how he never showed dejection or despair or frustration or anger in his stony face as he tried to do his job. He never got pushy or obnoxious - just stood there, trying to stay out of people's way as they crossed the street and still try to get a flyer into someone's willing hand. I am sure the sandwich board was not comfortable - I bet people bump into it all the time. A few people actually stopped and he talked earnestly to them, pointing down the street toward the store, eager to cross the street with them to show them where to go....but no one crossed the street with him, no one headed off to get a mani/pedi or a hair cut..

I walked over and asked him for a flyer. He tried to walk me across the street - indicating to me that traffic needed to stop first - wait, wait, he said. I said I couldn't do it right now, as I had to get back to the office. He did not speak good english and so I used some sign language and slow talk...Work Now. Go Later, OK? ahhh OK...he got it. You come back here for Me, Yes? for Flyer?

The guy may get paid a tiny bit to distribute the flyers, but I now understand that he really earns money if HIS standing on the corner results in a sale in the store. His dinner, his family may depend on me not only taking his piece of paper (only to toss it in a garbage can down the street) but going TO the store and buying something and being sure to let them know HE is the reason I am here. Ah ha - commission sales!

What an easy, painless way to HELP someone! And they are everywhere, those folks who work on commission - the phone guys in the mall, the ladies at macy's, the guy selling a car, the girls selling cookies by the liquor store. We are gonna buy this stuff anyway, and I know how I just loathe being harrassed by "salesmen" when I just want to look and make my decision....so why not just buy the slightly overpriced box of cookies from the girls in green, even though Oreos are on sale? I dunno, I just find it annoying to be ASKED to buy something....

But the way he said "please." The futility and hope mixed in his soft voice...Maybe this will be the one that goes and gets a manicure, maybe I ride the subway home tonight instead of walking 90 blocks (after standing on the street corner for 8 straight hours). I was actually planning to get a mani/pedi anyway - they are 50% cheaper here than they are in Tucson. Now, instead of the usual place in my old 'hood Hellsea (Hell's Kitchen has been so cleaned up, they've given it a new cleaned up name!), I think I will go back to that corner tomorrow and let him walk me over to his store.....and next time I am at Macy's I might let the over eager lady "start a dressing room" for me...and I will remember her name and let the clerk know who helped me.....and I will get that darn box of Samoa's even though I know they are really expensive...

I promise I won't be so annoyed the next time someone shoves a piece of paper at me, or implores me to buy something, and I will remember this sad, hopeful man who said Please.