Same Day, Different Guy

Same Day, Different Guy


A man sits on the subway, down on his luck, angry at the world, and basically
just full of negative thoughts. Up to this point, life had not been fair to him.
Someone else always got the promotion, someone else always got the girl, and someone else was living the life that was supposed to be his. So with hatred and distrust,
and the time to use it, he sits on the subway ready to judge those around him.

As he stares down the aisle at the many faces, he acts as if he knows them
all. For instance, that lady wears too much makeup, so she must be a tramp.
That guy buries his head in a book, so he must be a nerd. There's the
business man with the fancy suit talking on his cell phone, must be a
corporate big wig who steps on everyone in his path. Maybe the girl with the
purple hair and the ripped up leather coat is looking for her next robbery
victim. But today, today he chooses to hate the bald man.

Sitting in the corner is a white man, dressed in a suit with a long black
overcoat. He's about thirty-five years old, too young to have lost all his
hair naturally. So why is he bald, and why is he smiling? What does he know? Maybe
he's a racist. Maybe his head is shaved because he belongs to a white
supremacist group. Yeah, that must be it. And maybe he is smiling because
thoughts of hate are running through his mind, and when he gets off this
train, he will unleash that hate onto someone weaker than him. Someone of another color or race. What a terrible man he must be.

So the man that sits on the subway, down on his luck, angry at the world, has
found today's victim. Someone to hate, someone to judge, someone he can be
better than on this day when it’s easier for him to point fingers than to have compassion for those around him. With an agenda like that, there is no need to improve
oneself. No need when there are so many other people he can judge and put
beneath him. And as the train slows to a stop, and the "racist" gets off the
train with his smile and his baldhead. Mr. negative wonders who this mans unlucky
victim will be.

Across town, a few hours later, a little girl lies in bed with her mom. Dad
is late from work. He missed dinner.........He never misses dinner. As the
little girl listens to her mom reading the nightly bedtime story, she can't help but wonder where her daddy is.

Today was another hard day for the little girl. Life played a cruel trick on this little angel a year prior. At the age of eight, she was told that she had cancer. This is allot to handle for anyone, especially a little girl. A year had passed and the Chemotherapy really started to take its toll. The kids at school found it so easy to tease, to judge, to make fun of the little girl who had to wear hats all day, even indoors. But even hats drew less attention than the baldhead she wore underneath.

The night before, it was her daddy that read the bedtime story. He tried so
hard to make her feel special, make her feel comfortable. When he looked at her, all he saw was a part of himself; the very best part, and he loved her more than life itself.

Over the last few months he tried gifts, words, and jokes to lift her spirits. But as he read
the story that night before, he realize that nothing he could say or give could show his little girl that he knew what she was going thru. But on that night, he realized that it wasn't as important for him to "feel" what she was feeling, it was more important for her to know that he was “there” for her. It was more important for her to know that he didn't hate her, judge her, or look down on her because of her head without the beautiful hair she once had.

As mom turned the page of the book, they both heard a noise in the kitchen. Mother
and daughter immediately looked at the bedroom doorway, knowing exactly who it would be, Dad was home.

He walked into the doorway of her room and smiled. They both looked at him, mouths wide open, and speechless. In a quiet voice, like nothing was wrong, he asked if he could finish the story that mom had started. Without a word mom got up, walked to her husband, kissed him on the forehead, and left the room.

Dad walked to the bed and sat down. The little girl, still speechless, laid
her head on his shoulder. He picked up the book and before he began reading
he said the following,

"Sorry I was late dear, I had to get my haircut."

The little girl said, "I know daddy," and as she rubbed his BALD HEAD she
whispered, "thank you daddy, I Love you."

The moral of this story is that the racists you thought was sitting next to
you, very well may have been the greatest Dad in the world. Don't judge
people until you really know them.


JKD