Paying it Forward

Some of you might have seen the new community on the LJ Spotlight, payingitforward - a community where people ask for help for third parties, and others do what they can; or just talk about the nice things they've done, or people have done for them.

Well, here's mine - and it's not what you think:

Over the weekend, after the initial discovery was made about Brenda ceasing the in-take of donations for Lakota-Aid, I paid $20.00 (p+p) as a donation for the DVD about Pine Ridge. Then, the next day, I paid $25.00 to the Propane Fund from the Friends of Pine Ridge.

I spent hours emailing people and organisations and creating lakota_support - trying to rally supporters (even just people who can pass on word of what is going on - or indeed, what is not) and bring to light what is happening.

During the day, I received information about a little boy with leukaemia and made my first post at payingitforward.

Laying in bed, last night, I couldn't sleep for thinking about Pine Ridge and how I could raise money and awareness, and help poor little Marcus Ten Fingers. I came up with some ways and did a few calculations, and today I sent $100 cash (recorded, don't worry) direct to his family, with a card and some sweets/candy.

Walking to my psychic development group in the rain, in the middle of London, in the evening rush hour, I still wanted to do more. It's like eating, but never feeling full - no matter how much I gave, it felt insufficient.

And then, I stopped to buy something for dinner in a supermarket, and when I returned outside - still dark, still wet, still awash with commuters oblivious to the world around them, blanking the homeless man in the doorway, attempting to make a living from selling The Big Issue.

I stopped, and pulled out my wallet, asking how much it cost, these days.

"£1.50", he told me, and started to take a new copy out of his little plastic wallet.

And I realised something: I never read the actual magazine. I buy it to help the sellers out.

"Here," I said, giving him the money, "you may as well keep the copy and sell it to someone else, I never read it - just cut out the middle-man and take the money."

The grateful smile and the sincere 'thank you' that man gave me - for just £1.50 ($3.00) - was so rewarding. I finally felt like I'd done something to make someone's day just a little bit better. And I realised how hard I've been any time I've walked past the sellers in the street who are trying to make a living, even in their position, when they could be begging.

I'm not going to get to see the smiles on the faces of the Ten Fingers family, but if they're even a fraction as grateful as he was - and I'm confident they will be, for anything anyone can give - it'll be worth having to tighten the purse strings for the rest of the month.