This morning at the corner bodega, while I was picking out an orange for breakfast, the homeless guy next to me was stealing peaches. He would pick up two at a time, shove them into his plastic bag, and make the sign of the cross. He did this contradictory ritual 4 or 5 times, making sure to finish his invisible cross before moving on to the next two peaches. For some reason, I found this fascinating at 8am and just stood there and watched him. 

My first thought was, “Peaches… good choice, lots of vitamins.” You normally don’t see homeless people eating fruit. This guy wants to be healthy. If I was homeless, I’d probably want peaches too. Then I thought, “Obviously this guy doesn’t want to have to steal if he is so concerned with making crosses.”

Just then, Mr. Peach got caught, the bodega owner starts chasing him and he is hobbling as fast as he can down the sidewalk and I turn away to go and find some coffee because this is just too much action so early in the morning. I don’t know if he had to give his peaches back or not. I want to think he got away. 

For some reason I’ve been thinking about this episode all day. Even though you’re not supposed to steal, you’re also supposed to feed your neighbor or something like that. The homeless man apologized with his little crosses after his “sin”, did the bodega owner do any signs of the cross for not loving his neighbor? Probably not. So who’s really in the wrong here? Hmmm…..