What To Do… or Not To Do.

A tricky one for you, this week,

One of my better qualities, I think, is my ability to see opposing sides of an argument. I may feel pretty strongly about something but that rarely seems to stop me from seeing how the other side feels about it.

This has its downside too. It means I can often be wishy-washy about things. I can dither over reaching conclusions and, sometimes, in matters where I patently should have stood strong from minute one, I have wasted time vacillating.

But enough about me… what do you think about me?

No, No…

I’ve been mulling over a question this week, it’s a fair example of how I tend to go at things from different angles. I’ll tell you about it and if you want to suggest to me what I should do, that would be nice too…

…although I may not do it.

Right. There’s this Lady, you see, and she sits on the main street of our town every day and she plays her wooden flute. She’s not from this country originally but that’s neither here nor there – I only mention it to colour the picture in a little bit. Six days a week, she sits on the ground from 9.30am to 6.00pm and she toots her flute.  She doesn’t do much harm. Perhaps she blocks the footpath a bit, perhaps her crutch sticks out a bit further than it needs to – a ploy to get attention, maybe – nothing really troublesome.

The main issue one might have with this Lady is that she can’t actually play the flute she toots. She just pipes out a series of tuneless random notes, all day, every day.

And here’s the thing, here’s my quandary; I never give her any money.

Am I right or am I wrong?

That, as the man said, is the question…

The case for giving the Lady a few pence is fairly straightforward. She has some need, lest she would not be there. I can afford to give her a few pence. It wouldn’t kill me. My moral code tells me I should be mindful of those less well-off than myself. Therefore I should give.

The case against is perhaps less clear but it is the one which currently sways me. I have it on good authority that the Lady is quite severely arthritic. That crutch is not just for ‘show’, when she finally wends her way home at six in the evening, she hobbles on her way. This Lady was there in the coldest days of this harsh season. In temperature of –8 degrees, she was on the pavement, tooting her flute, seeking alms.

That last bit, that’s the crux of why I don’t give her any of my money. I believe that she is encouraged to sit there every day, by person or persons, who see her getting money from people. I believe her suffering of the endless days on the pavement and the bitter, bitter, cold is a direct result of her receiving money and, if there was no money, she would not be sent to sit there.

So, that’s my case, if I give her money, her painful days will continue. If I don’t, and everybody else doesn’t too, perhaps those who tell her to sit there will stop doing so.

But that’s all a bit easy, isn’t it? I’ve made up a little moral reason for me not to give.  But what if I am wrong? What if the Lady is sitting there of her own accord, freezing, because there is nothing else for her, no other way to get money of any kind. What if I am walking past her, my pockets jingling, as she starves?

And I’m putting myself across as some kind of bloody saint here – pondering the fate of the Lady we all ignore. Trust me, I am no bloody saint. If I am to be honest, this Lady, with her incessant tuneless tooting, annoys me.

“She sits there for ten hours every day,” I say to myself, “why doesn’t she teach herself a tune to pass then time… and then have something coherent to play.”

Yeah, and that crutch of hers sticks out so far and makes me walk around it… and she never asks me for money, she only asks the Old Folks, the ‘Easy Marks’ and… and… and…

Yes. I’ve got high motives, I can reel them off when I need to… but are they real?

What is the truth of my not giving any money to the Lady in the street?

If you know, let me know.