The Blind Man
	Years ago when I was just a kid on Ellicott Street, most of the boys in the neighborhood went barefooted...even to school. In our old black and white class picture of us in the fourth grade, at Edison Elementary School, I think there were only two kids wearing shoes. One day in the neighborhood, I was about twelve I think, I was barefooted, as usual, and for some reason had walked up to the corner of 22nd Street and Hillsborough Avenue. The new, big Sears store was on one corner and the Holsum bakery was on another. It was a blazing hot summer day and as I crossed Hillsborough Avenue there was an older man sitting on a bench on the corner. He was yelling, "Please, someone help me! HELP!" The man was blind and was sitting in the beating down sun. He had pencils he was selling and a paper cup for the coins he would get. He was not wearing a hat. I went up to him and asked if I could help. He said he had been sitting on the bench for hours waiting for the bus to come, that someone had told him that it was a good place to sell his pencils. He was from somewhere across town. I could see the actual bus stop bench about a block and a half up the street. I told him that he was at the wrong bench. He said, "Will you please walk me to the bench?" He took my arm and we made our way toward the right bus stop in the relentless sun. He slowly shuffled his feet taking about five inch steps. He said, "I wasn't always like this. I used to have my sight and I was young." I actually was very interested in what he was saying but my feet were literally cooking on the HOT sidewalk. It was one of those days where you could fry eggs on the pavement. My feet were like a roast cooking in a frying pan. When we reached the bench I sat with him until the bus came. I pulled my feet up under the bench into the shadow and I could feel their temperature lowering. I don't think he ever knew anything about my feet. It was painful to walk for the rest of the day and a little the next but then I was fine. In looking back I don't know why I didn't go get the man some water from somewhere while we waited. I guess at that age you're not fully cooked yet....except for the feet. Lynn Ash Side Note: When I see people walking their dogs on a really hot sidewalk I know that because they're wearing shoes it just doesn't occur to them that the sidewalk might be hot. I've found that if you mention it as unobtrusively as possible, that the response is almost always "Oh my God, I never even thought of that!" and yes, to my friends, I do it without even telling them the blind man story.