A Chef, A Poor Man, and The President

Homeless Man Ronald Davis 2013

"My name is Ronald Davis, and I’ve been on the streets for a year and a half now. Life is rough. I’ve slept on the curbs, under bridges, I’ve slept under cardboard boxes and stuff trying to survive. Especially in the wintertime, - it’s the hardest time. I fill out applications and stuff and I’m not looking presentable. And then they say, well, leave a number and we’ll call you. But how can I when I don’t have a phone? So, it’s just a struggle out there. From day to day, I come out and panhandle with my cup --- some days I don’t even have enough to get a room so I just sleep on the street. It’s really humiliating to be shaking a cup and people look at you like you’re a bum. I’ve had people walk past me and say, get a job, bum. And I say, wait a minute, I’m a human being, I’m not a bum."

Our lives are more and more complicated these days. When you see a man like this, what do you feel? Resentment? sympathy, apathy, empathy, or even annoyance that he is everywhere you turn?

Maybe you feel a little angry or scared because he could be you? The pressure from the top seems to be pushing us down another rung. Some of us are one paycheck away from free falling into the streets of poverty like Ronald, while the leaders whom we voted for promised to make America great again.

Some leaders like President Trump, appear to be treating the world like his own private monopoly board. While he promised to abide by the laws laid down in the American Constitution not to make profit for himself while president, he has set up the monopoly game as a rigged system to put money into his own private coffers for the sake of his dying hotels. He does this while boasting of creating jobs for people like Ronald. Trump makes it seem as though the Air Force crew making stops to his properties were all a coincidence. He hasn't said "I'll return the money and correct the situation." His words were "they had good taste."

In the middle of many Americans day-to-day struggle to keep body and soul together at all levels,
maybe fearing we'll get a pink slip or eviction notice, a man presides over us who is obsessed with making more money for himself while violating the Constitution to do it. He seems to be all powerful with no heart. Imagine this: an act of nature has wiped out your home, left death and destruction around you for endless miles. You’re alive but food and what little water there is, is running out. You and countless survivors are walking around in an endless nightmare. Finally, there is news of a ship that will take you off this island to a better place with food, water, and a chance to recover from the devastation. With your baby in arm, and maybe a suitcase in hand, you get to the ship, cross the gang plank, and find a seat. You think to yourself, it won’t be long now. And then it happens. A voice over a loudspeaker announces that all those without the proper papers must get off. The hope for relief that you had in your hands has dissolved. With a numb dizziness, you pick up your child and your belongings and walk slowly down the gang plank. The voices of others walking beside you can be heard as well with deep expressions of disbelief.

Victims of Dorian Disembark after refusal By Trump To Enter US

It’s seems that Donald Trump, out of his racist inclination, has decided to prevent those people who
might be drug users, and gang members (in his mind) from boarding a ferry for relief. He attempts to speak to this humanitarian crisis as though he is doing what is best for America and preventing those from what he calls “a shithole country” (code for people of color) from infecting us with the wrong kind of people.  

"We have to be very careful. Everybody needs total proper documentation. ---The Bahama's have some tremendous problems with people going to the Bahama's who weren't supposed to be there. I don't want to allow people who weren't supposed to be in the Bahama's to come into the United States--- including some very bad people, and some very bad gang members and some very very bad drug dealers." -President Trump

Many people were looking forward to having some relief from that class 5 hurricane that destroyed lives and property, only to have their hope sink by a President who equates immigration with drugs and gang members. He has presented no facts to back up this decision, just an agenda to keep a certain kind of person from entering, while he is free to travel wherever he pleases managing monopolies with his brand on it that are designed to make millions for him.

If you’ve apologized to others for this president’s behavior you’re not alone. His actions, in my book of how a President should behave, make him deeply immoral.

Ironically, I stumbled on this Tweet from a man named Chef Jose Andres. In the background cooks are busy cooking massive quantities of food as he narrates in the foreground.

It’s an amazing spectacle of men and women who are part of an effort to feed the survivors. Their thoughts are not for themselves but a way to get the food to parts of the Bahamas faster giving some relief. I had almost forgotten in a world that believes winning means to take more for yourself, what Chef Andres is doing gives hope.  

Andre is the founder of a group called World Kitchen that seems to be responders to the needs of hungry people all over the globe. This man could have forged out a career for himself catering to the rich, or a reality show celebrity chef, but he has chosen to inspire others to make a difference.

One man through the veil of his racism acts out his bigotry and attempts to make it appear patriotic. There are some like him who justify their hate for others with the same distain. Or we kid ourselves in believing that poverty and homelessness will never touch us. So we associate it with race or that person isn’t trying hard enough or else he wouldn’t have to beg.

Ronald has passed on. His final words are worth remembering, because people matter. "No matter what people think about me, I know I’m a human first. Just because I’m down on my luck, it doesn’t give nobody an excuse to call me a bum--- because I’m not."