You have no idea who I use to be!!!!!

     A very close friend of mine told me a story once.  Back when he was a youngster, causing trouble and raising a ruckus as young men did back in those days (and still want to do). He and his buddies were bothering this old homeless man.  Typical kind of disrespectful banter that many of us would have done when we were young and would pretend to be shocked when we hear about it today.  The old man sat there, head hanging low.  His body language screamed of failed dreams and lost hope.  He sat there, leaning up against the side of the building, just taking the verbal abuse that these young punks were hurling at him. He didn’t look up. He didn’t say a word.  He just took assault.  Wave after wave of audible punches being delivered to this man’s soul. Finally, my friend said something that I cannot repeat here, but it was something that triggered some sense of worth in that homeless man. A fire that had long laid dormant glowed in his previously dead eyes.  He got up from his spot against that wall.  He grew from a shriveled little man trying to hide from the world to an imposing figure of over 6 feet tall.  His back straight.  His shoulders back.  His head held high and looking right into the now surprised and somewhat frighten eyes of my friend.  In a voice that my friend says he can still here some 30 years later, the homeless man said to him…”You have no idea who I use to be.”  Holding back a fury that was extremely visible in his face, the homeless man took a couple of deep breaths, then he sighed.  He shook his head as if to acknowledge that he was wasting his time on these young thugs.  He sat back down and returned to his section of the building, ignoring the weather, the hunger that was obvious from the sounds of his growling belly that my friend could hear, and the taunts of the other teenagers who continued to shout comments at the man.  Everyone but my friend, who stood there in shock at first, then in wonder.  Who was this homeless man?  What was the journey like that led this man from wherever or whoever he was to this, a homeless man, sitting on the street, taking crap from a bunch of young punks.  Needless to say, my friend never picked on him again.

     Now you might be asking, what the purpose of this story is?  As a man who has led many lives; young minority kid growing up in the South Bronx, college student and graduate, sailor who has traveled the world, radio personality on a top 5 show in a top 50 market with an incredibly loyal audience, zombie enthusiast and academic, and now professional 9 to 5er dispensing career service advice to recent college graduates, you never know who you are talking to.  You have no idea of the journey that anyone has taken…or what your journey holds next.  The greatness that you might have always felt you should achieve, or the hopeless of being destitute begging for change.  Show respect for all and always be kind.  After all, not only do you not know who that person used to be, they don’t know who you use to be either.

     By the way, that friend of mine?  He grew up to be an incredible person who took me in at a time when I almost ended up homeless.  I never would have guessed he was the punk in the story