"Same Kind of Different as Me"

I'm usually very happy after posting something on my blog. Vanity no doubt accounts in part, but there's also that sense of creating something - even if it's just an account, a retelling. And there's the work aspect of it, the satisfaction of reaching the end, of having communicated. There's not much else that I do that brings those things together in such a way.

But not this time. I was glad to no longer have the weight of this story (previous four posts) hanging over me like a dreaded term paper, but absent was the sense of pleasure I usually feel.

I think it's because the Not-So-Good Samaritan story was so unflattering to me. When I write something humorous, I don't think I'm doing it to flatter myself, but making people laugh has that side-effect. When I write about deep things, I'm flattering myself there, too, because it feels good to think I 'm wise, that I can offer something that is helpful, even illuminating.

Not that I write with those motives uppermost. At least, I hope I'm not that deceived. If you're saying, "Yep, she's as blind as she is egotistical," let me know. Just be gentle, my friends.

But this story was hardcore narration. I wrote it in the third person because I wanted some distance; I wanted to see myself as I was, to recreate the scene without the airbrushing effect of the first-person perspective.

And so, when it was finished, I was depressed. Just like the photo you see of yourself, and you say, "Do I really look like that? That middle-aged? That frumpy?"

But here it wasn't about appearances. It was about my heart, or lack thereof.

Just a week or so before this incident, I'd finished a book I've since been requiring my family and badgering my friends to read. It's the story of a friendship between an international art dealer and a homeless former sharecropper, and the woman who brought them together. It's called "Same Kind of Different as Me" by Ron Hall and Denver Moore. Whether you desire to be a better follower of Christ or just like quality non-fiction, this book should be on your list.

I don't want to spoil the book because I do hope that all of you will read it, but I promise that you will find yourself caught up in a story so incredible, so impacting, so vibrant with purpose, that you will not be the same afterwards. That's saying a lot, I know, but it's true. Fortunately, you will not find within its pages the "Not-So-Good Samaritan", but rather individuals of heroic stature, people who make you rethink what it is to be Christian, what it is to be human.

The Not-So-Good-Samaritan, the end

She continued to steal glances, noticing his long fingernails, yellowed, ribbed, thick, but rounded, as if he kept them long on purpose. They were still transparent enough for the dirt to show through. His clothes were too dirty for a nursing home, too clean to suggest homelessness. He probably did really live on Spottswood.

"Where did you say you live?"

This time he paused, "I don't know the answer to that."

"You said you lived on Spottswood." He didn't appear to notice the shape her voice had taken. She knew he wouldn't, but hearing herself take on a distant, business tone gave her some satisfaction, as if by withdrawing her former solicitousness, she was expressing disdain for him and solidarity towards his ill-treated wife.

"Well, if I said so, then it must be." He was unconcerned. Happy as a clam to ride around town with the lady in the red coat, to be off his sore foot.

Her efforts to get him to produce some identification failed; he seemed unwilling to pull out the wallet he'd indicated he had. She continued in the direction he was heading when she first found him.

If he didn't know where he lived, he definitely knew where they were. Along the way, he pointed out where he'd worked as a city engineer.

"I designed the entire sewer system for that development there. Nice townhomes, those. My wife said, 'Why don't we buy one?' So we did. Chatham Village. A very nice place."

"But you don't live there anymore?"

"No, we sold it."

As they passed Eastgate Shopping Center, "And I put that system in, too. The stores are different now, though."

Deciding to make the best of it, old enough herself to indulge in nostalgia, she said, "I know. I saw my first movie there at the Paramount. The Sound of Music."

"I believe you're right. There was a movie theatre there."

"And on N. Mendenhall one street north was where my wife had her shop."

"Your wife had a shop?"

"Yes, indeed. It was a fancy fabric shop. The name was Fabrique." He said this as if the word had a bad smell. Then he spelled it lest she not understand its French flavor. "She ordered beautiful fabrics from all over the world. One-of-a-kind materials for her snooty customers. And she was always running off at midnight to meet the delivery truck for a shipment."

The woman thought, "Right. Midnight shipments. He doesn't even suspect anything here, but he wanted to beat her up for lying about her age. He's stupid as well as mean."

"What is your address on Spottswood, Mr. Sommerfield?"

"I'll know it when I see it. Just keep going."

After a mixed up monologue about the stillborn baby, who in this version, hadn't died, but been aborted, he said,

"But my wife got herself a child, a boy."

Apparently by adoption, it seemed, though the last names were different.

"Does he live here in Memphis?"' she asked hopefully. "Does he know you went to the hospital?"

"Yes, he's a lawyer of some kind. We haven't talked in four years."

"Turn right here," he said, as she approached Highland. "And my street is just past that Catholic Church. You'll need to get in that turning lane."

Relieved to see his confidence, that the street looked like a place where a man like this would live, she cheered within.

"And here we are," he announced proudly.

"Here" was a house fit for Arthur J. Sommerfield. White clapboard, paint peeling, it had spotty repairs and makeshift additions, giving it an abused, bandaged look. A "No Trespassing" sign was nailed to the front of the house. She imagined neighborhood boys daring each other to ring the doorbell, just to torment the old man. But he was no Boo Radley, she reminded herself.

"Whose car is that with the Mississippi tags?" she asked. It looked like it'd been parked there for a long time, the grass having grown up through the crumbled concrete that had been the driveway.

"One that belongs to that no-good boarder of mine. He fancies himself some kind of writer, says he's writing a book. Has some high-fallutin' degree from an Ivy League school."

His answer was so swift and certain, it put to rest all doubt that this was his house.

"Well, Mr. Sommerfield, here we are," she said, as she pulled into the driveway, careful to put the car in park, give it some gas, pray the car wouldn't die.

"You've been most kind. I'm very grateful". It took him a few tries to raise himself up out of the low seat and out of the car.

She thought about walking him to the door, seeing if there was really an Ivy Leaguer in the house, but she couldn't face seeing the inside of that house. She didn't want to encounter anything that would keep her from driving out of there, anything that would require any further involvement. She was finished.

It would take him a long time with his one shoe to cross the yard, get inside. She didn't wait to see.