The Limits of My Generosity

are pretty narrow.

Yesterday Patrick found a grandfather and grandson (the younger is 33) who've come up here from Mississippi in the wake of the hurricane. Their house was destroyed, and now they're staying in an apartment building owned by a pastor they have a connection with. (Darrell is a pastor, himself--though Darrell isn't his real name.) Since the building needs renovation and is currently vacant, they are staying free of charge, but they don't know how long this arrangement will last.

To my surprise, Darrell and Matthew were over when I got home from work this afternoon. It was clear enough that for Darrell, at least, it's difficult to feel, act, or be dependent on charity. Anyway, after much persuading, Darrell accepted Patrick's offer of a ride, and Patrick spent the next two hours driving around the South Side while I stayed home and graded quizzes. Traffic in Chicago really sucks.

I'd been thinking of listing our apartment on the Stanford Alumni list as a potential refuge for a single person displaced by the hurricane (I feel a little odd about the name Katrina, as though a hurricane is anything like a human being), but now I'm pretty sure I won't. I'd forgotten how particular I am about things. It raised flags of varying colors for me when I went to the bathroom after Matthew's shower and the soap was at the bottom of the bath tub, my wash cloth was draped on the edge of the sink (even though Patrick had given Matthew a clean one to use), and the toilet brush was knocked over. What's more, they had called saying they were hungry, then they left the spaghetti that Patrick cooked for us all half-eaten. We ended up throwing their leftovers away.

Patrick's comment is something about how when you try to do good things for people, you can't go around wishing that the people were different. I guess this is sort of akin to the argument that if you give money to a guy on the street, you have no right to tell him what to use it for and what not to (although opening your home to someone is pretty different from just giving away money). Anyway, this all seems to reflect on my awareness that I love humanity in general, just not any specific humans.

I don't mean to speak badly of a demographic, and I hope no one will take this account as a sign that the refugees of the hurricane (I understand that "refugee" is not an approved term because of the negative connotations relating to refugees in other countries. My response: What the heck is that supposed to mean about refugees in other countries???) don't deserve aid. I don't even mean to speak badly of Darrell and Matthew; on some levels that I'm aware of and others that I'm not, their actions are not rude or unjustified. On the contrary, I mean to illustrate my own limitations, to wonder whether my standards are absurd or hypocritical, to stop taking for granted a few of the things which I do.

The trouble with trying to get past these limitations is that it's easy to end up in a missionary phase where you'll do anything for anyone as long as you're convinced that you're better than they are. One benefit about teaching middle school: it is wholly appropriate to treat the students like children, because that's what they are. And as such, I can accept all kinds of immaturity, meanness, apparent stupidity, and silliness from them without judging them.

I walked downstairs to do laundry and ran into another new resident in our apartment complex. Turns out he's from Irvine but hates SoCal (perfect) and fraternities (also perfect). I said that Patrick and I had been living in Palo Alto, and he immediately mentioned Stanford and a few things he's heard about it from friends who've gone there (like the fact that there's no life off campus). Then somebody he'd been waiting for came by and he left and said "See ya later."

This brings to mind a thought I'd been having: I've run into a couple of people who I really didn't expect to see here, didn't know they were in the Chi at all, but then on the street, in the grocery store, whatever, there they are. But maybe it's not really a small world after all at all. More likely, it seems, is that the stratum of people that most individuals associate with is narrow, and everyone in your same stratum goes to the same places you go and knows the same sort of people you know.

I don't know what this is supposed to suggest. I'm just feeling very stratified, I guess. Not quite disconnected or isolated, but stratified.