J. Osbourne's Song

As his every-days are spent, he sits there with an emptied instant noodle cup in his hands, only a piece of cardboard gives him comfort on the concrete. People various whereabouts pass him by, the college student late for his religious education class, a teacher taking her lunch break to make groceries for her family, the businessman who will attend an important meeting across the street, yet they seem like faceless ovals in gray suits, gray and cold as the concrete the aged man is sitting on. Every now and then he shakes his cup just enough to make a clink of loose coins, trying to penetrate the glassy blur in front of him. The faceless ovals in gray suits conditioned to ignore the clink of loose coins and immune to the sight of the aged man as if their senses were cut out of them. But once in a while, a curious child, not yet conditioned to ignore the clink of coins and not yet immune to the aged man’s sight, or a conscious dreamer seeking for a wake up call, or a life-ponderer refusing to become one of the faceless ovals in gray suits, stop and hear the ringing of the coins as it was a wake up call, see the aged man as it was a sign for the meaning of life, or, like through the eyes of a child, microscopically notice the details of the aged man’s character. The thin silver hair, his face drawn by lines of his history, and if you’re lucky, a catch of his smile. For free. Like the other day, a priceless memory had been picked up by a life-ponderer seeking for something soul-touching.

 

As the life-ponderer made his way through the gray, cold stream of ovals, he couldn’t help but pay attention down to the aged man eating a piece of bread. About to turn his eyes away from the man, he suddenly noticed a bunch of street children making their way from the opposite direction. As they neared the aged man, without even a second thought the aged man reached out with his hand and offered the piece of bread he was eating, and smiled.
It all happened within a blink of an eye and the situation itself seemed meaningless, yet for the life-ponderer that fraction of time lingered in him. “Was I meant to see it? Was it a sign?” a train of thoughts crossed his mind. But whatever it was, he felt blessed at that moment. He looked back once more, and continued his way through the gray blur of ovals.

The aged man had nothing, yet he had something to offer. How much more then can we give? I’m afraid that someday I might become a faceless oval in a gray suit in a world of faceless ovals in gray suits. I’m already one of them passing by the aged man everyday, getting immune to the clink of loose coins. I try to remind myself to give him something, be it money, or simply a smile just to acknowledge that I see him, because he gives much more in return that is priceless. He reminds me of my blessings.

"What if God was one of Us?"

He is all of us.

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