Yesterday was a bad day.  As far as bad days go, I thought, “this is a doozie.”  Someone said to me, “we’ve hit a new low.”  And I thought it was true.

But then I drank beer with some good friends.  Drank beer and ate chocolate.  And I felt like the new low was not really so low.  Because I have good friends and beer and chocolate.

As I was riding my bike home sometime after midnight, I rode past a figure lying face down on the sidewalk, a man in a blue parka.  I stopped a few feet away and called out, “Are you okay?”  He tried to move but couldn’t.  “You don’t need to call anyone,” he said, his voice muffled against the pavement.  As he lifted his face to me, I saw a pool of blood collecting in the brim of his straw Panama hat, where he’d been resting his head.  His glasses were cracked and bloody.  “You don’t need to call 911,” he said, “but if you could just watch me.  For a minute.  I am very drunk and I’ve fallen and I am close to my house.  If you could just watch me stand up.”  I waited as he rolled over and then over again on the sidewalk, seemingly unable to even move into a sitting position.

“I don’t think you can stand up,” I said.  “I think I should call someone.”

“Let me explain,” he said.  “I appreciate your concern.  You are very nice to watch me.  I understand that you are worried, but I was at a party for some… very good people. Who died.  Let me explain.  I am not having a good day.  But I can make it to my house, if I can just roll over here.”

And I waited.  Finally, some people came along, stumbling home from the bars on 4th Avenue–a man and a woman.  “Are you all okay?” they asked.

“He’s hurt,” I said, grateful for some company.  The woman said, “Grandpa, are you drunk?  Homeless?  Are you okay, old man?” (though he was not that old).  She said, “Let’s get you home, gramps,” and she and her friend went to him and grabbed his arms.  “Don’t do it like that,” she snapped her friend, assuring the man was uprighted with the utmost gentleness.

“Let me explain,” he said.  “I am very drunk.  And I’ve fallen.  It’s my fault.”

“I’m going to get you to your house, and take a look at this cut you’ve got,” she said.  I waited until it was clear they’d take care of him, then I pedaled up the hill.

Typically, I’m not one for unsubtle symbolism, but I’m not sure I’ve had a more conveniently symbolic moment than biking home on the “new low” day to find a man who is literally face down in the gutter on Easter Sunday.  The gutter—our symbol of emotional lowness—on Easter—our cultural celebration of resurrection.  As symbolic moments go, this one is so unsubtle that I almost talked myself out of writing about it.  The obvious lesson from this story is that I cannot possibly be at a low of any sorts when my basic needs are so plentifully met: I have not only bread and water but also beer and chocolate.  I live in a city of kind strangers, but I am also surrounded by generous friends.  I am not in the gutter, but instead I am riding by, sober enough to see myself into my cozy bed.  If we are here to talk about small things, my low is very small.

I think sometimes, as perhaps most people do, about the limits of my kindness.  I do not want to ignore someone in the gutter, but I do not want to pick him up and walk him home.  I have been taught to fear blood, and drunken strangers, and men on the streets when I am alone late at night.  Perhaps this symbol is better understood in the less obvious way: a sign of my limits, of what I am not willing to give to someone else.  This symbol is less convenient and lends itself less willingly to life lessons.  From it I can understand that, most of the time, we have no perspective on our own lives.  Surely this man, passed out on the street corner, had no more perspective than I did.  But today we are both reminded of something complex about ourselves, something we probably don’t prefer to consider.  We all want our lives to be easier.