Just before 6:00 this morning, a Saturday morning, our doorbell rang. After securing the dogs, I opened it slightly to see a strange woman there. Not strange in the bizarre sense, just in the unknown sense. She said to not be afraid of her, she just needed to borrow the phone.
Uh, no.
Would I be able to call a cab for her, have it pick her up at our house?
I'm not heartless. If she had appeared to be in any kind of distress, I would have certainly done this much for her, but she just seemed to have been out too late from Friday night. So taking all that into consideration, I said no. Well, mumbled no, because I just woke up.
"I can't do it," I said. I was fumbling around in my sleep-deprived brain for a nice little lie to make it easier, but no. "I can't," I repeated. Then somewhat rudely, I shut the door, locked it and watched through a blind as she walked away and turned off onto the sidewalk.
To be perfectly honest, there was and still is a little guilt about it. I try to mitigate it with what bothers me most about the whole thing, but that doesn't make the guilt go away. I remember years ago when I was working at a liquor store, a very nice but very young teenage girl came in asking if she could use our bathroom. She had an "accident", you see. Seeing that we were a liquor store, the bathroom was in the back and the back was a restricted area, and I was alone up front so couldn't go back there with her, I had to say no and direct her to the restaurant across the street. As she walked away, I saw that the accident was very real, and I felt about 2 inches tall. I still carry that guilt with me to this day and I'd love nothing more than to apologize to her.
There is one big difference, the thing that bothers me the most about this incident, between the two events. Even though the woman at my door was very nice, and walked away without any apparent anger... IT WASN'T YET SIX O'FRIGGIN'CLOCK ON A SATURDAY MORNING! Who the hell goes around to strange houses at 6am ANY day let alone on a Saturday morning waking people up to call them a cab except in cases of emergencies? I live two blocks from a bus stop that would take her to a major bus terminal. There is a 24-hour gas station within walking distance where someone could easily ask an employee to call a cab for them. I think that's maybe about eight blocks from my home. Because of this, I doubt my guilt will last anywhere near as long as it has concerning that poor girl.
posted
by Tabby at 5/22/2004 02:49:00 p.m.
