The Little Girl and the Beggar

In early January, with all the Christmas lights and decorations adorning the stores, I visited the Museum of Modern Art on West 53rd Street, between 5^th and 6^th Avenue in Manhattan. After leaving the museum, I walked to 5^th Avenue and then headed south, to get a bus to go home. It was a sunny, clear day, temperate weather for that time of year. The street was filled with lots of well-dressed people, many seemed like tourists enjoying the holiday spirit and surrounded by holiday-dressed expensive stores. Now that I am retired, I have more time to explore the city and not have to rush to a next appointment. This also gives me time to observe what is happening around me. I was thinking about the Picasso exhibit I had seen, and that experience, added to the holiday decorations and bustle of people on the street, reminded me of my love for New York City and the diversity of pleasures it offered.

It was good to feel this, as I had been concerned about recent news reports on what was happening in the city. The influx of migrants and the city’s need to cut the budget of important social services to help provide support for them had saddened me. The photos of young migrants, some with children, many of whom had no permanent homes and were likely carrying everything they owned in the world, was upsetting and seemed especially cruel at this time of year.   

 I noticed a man begging on the street. He was African American, wearing a threadbare dirty gray jacket and was leaning against the side of a building. He held out a dented metal cup for donations. A little Hispanic girl, about 7 or 8 years old, with long black shiny hair and a light-colored winter coat that reached just below her knees, put what appeared to be a quarter into his cup. He thanked her, she smiled back, and then skipped happily to return to what appeared to be her family- a mother, father, and a younger brother, all of whom were pushing two supermarket carts filled with large plastic bags containing empty glass bottles and soda cans. I assumed they were planning to bring them to where they could collect the bottle deposit money.  The father reached out his hand, patted the little girl as she came close to him, and a smile filled with pride shone on his face. I felt a spiritual reverence and pleasure for what I had seen. In the midst of the opulence and holiday atmosphere of 5^th Avenue, I had just witnessed the spirit of the holiday happening among those most in need.

I don’t know if the little girl knew of her likely poverty, but it was clear that she felt joy from putting the coin in the beggar’s cup, and from her father’s look of approval and pride when she returned to his side. While it appeared that the girl’s family was financially impoverished, there was a love and spirit of giving that gave them riches.

After getting home, I told some friends about the art exhibit I had seen. I didn’t mention the experience I had watching the little girl and the beggar, it seemed incidental to the day. Days later when I realized that while the images from the museum and the holiday decorations were all still with me, it was the image of the little girl on the street that would stay with me longer than anything else I had seen, and affected me more profoundly.