THE HOMELESS PETS OF HARVARD SQUARE — by Steve Nadis
I stopped off at CVS on the way back from my daughter’s preschool this morning to buy some cat food. “Is that for the homeless guy in front with the cat and dog?” the cashier asked. “People have been buying pet food for him all day.”
“No,” I replied. “I didn’t see the guy. I was selfishly thinking of my own cat.”
But upon reflection, the whole thing strikes me as a bit odd. All day long, people have been buying food for the homeless guy’s cat and dog, but they’re not buying food for the homeless guy himself. Why is it we can’t bear the sight of hungry animals, yet we have hardened ourselves to the sight of hungry, homeless people?
Posted by
at
15:10:24
I re-read the 2 quotes of the CVS clerk…why are you assuming all the pet food was to feed the cat & dog?
Are we to assume you would only feel it was for the man if it was a doughnut, beef jerky or candybar? Seems petfood if a HECK of a lot more healthy nutrition-wise than most any ‘people-food’ you get in a convenience store.
(I like the Figaro tuna best, myself…;)
Wow, gee, MP, you got me there. I’m suffering from a temporary loss of words, which is almost incapacitating for a blogger…
whoops…Sorry ’bout that.
I’ve always called it like I see it.
(I’ve found it makes for “dramatic”
Internet relations
Go get the poor guy a juicy, hot #9 @ D’Angelo’s & see how the public reacts.
Then, notice if he shares it w/ his ‘friends’…
After a momentary lapse, I seem to have recovered my unique literary voice. Thanks MP, that’s an excellent suggestion!
Of course people are feeding the hungry animals. They (the hungry animals)can’t help themselves. Hungry people can. They can go to a soup kitchen, a shelter, go on welfare, get a job. Animals exist solely on our charity. I am currently feeding a stray cat in my backyard. Every time he comes around, I put out food for him. Without it, I know he will die. If I don’t feed a homeless person, will s/he die? Most likely not.
Well put, OR. I posed a question, and you surely answered it.
Point well taken, OR, but let us not forget there’s a flip side to this- animals have always scavenged, most quite successfully (though I agree these were domesticated pets), whereas humans rely more & more on the trucks that roll into the supermarket docks…
Say, there’s a new daily phenomena up here in Dover NH (& towns all along the coasts) that’s quietly become the norm: Seagulls- thousands of ‘em, stream up to the landfills at daybreak & stream back to their seacoast nesting areas as dusk approaches. (If only the oceans were transparent, we might see what we’ve done to the marine environment)
Well put, MP. So there’s the other side of the coin…