Numb.

My wife, Meredith, and I went to Toronto for the weekend. I had "earned" a free overnight stay in Toronto from my work for meeting a certain donation level to The United Way. Actually, it was a two night stay but we didn't realize this until it was too late. Meredith works on Saturdays and we both work on Monday, so, we only stayed one night. It was nice just the same.

We arrived around 6:00 pm, checked in to our room, and got ready. We ate dinner in one of the three restaurants at The Delta East, our hotel. We both had steak. It was good. I had a couple Manhattans. I like Manhattans, sometimes. Meredith drank water. She's pregnant. After dinner we went back to our room, changed again, and went down to the pool. I went straight for the hot tub. From time to time, the muscles around and between my shoulder blades freak out. I was hoping the hot tub would help a bit. Meredith went in the pool and then joined me a few minutes later. She only dipped her feet in the hot tub. She's pregnant.

After we had our fill of the pool area we went back up to the room, popped on the TV, and ordered room service. We split a piece of mandarin-scented cheesecake and some vanilla ice cream. I had one more Manhattan. I like Manhattans, sometimes. Meredith drank water. She's pregnant. We contemplated ordering a pay-per-view movie. They were showing "The Bourne Ultimatum". It's the last in the series of three movies and neither Meredith nor I had seen it yet. The cost to order the movie was $13.99 + tax so we used our better judgement and passed on the movie. $13.99 + tax is too much for a movie but $25.00 + tax for dessert and a drink delivered to your hotel room isn't, I guess. We watched some Law & Order SVU and fell asleep.

This morning we woke up, got ready, and checked out. We drove to a bagel shop around the corner from where we were staying and had breakfast. After breakfast we drove in to the city. Our hotel was in a suburb about 30 minutes outside of Toronto, taking traffic into consideration. Our first stop was H&M on Bluerr Street. Meredith was looking around and I decided that I wanted coffee. I walked about a block to a nearby Starbuck's that I am familiar with from previous trips. I ordered my usual cold beverage; an iced grande vanilla whole milk latte. For Meredith, I ordered an iced half-caf grande soy latte. She's pregnant.

As I was walking back to H&M I saw a girl standing in the middle of the sidewalk holding a sign made out of notebook paper, trying her hardest to make her presence known to me. I walked towards her as if she had a tractor beam pulling me in. As I got closer I began reading the red ink on her paper sign. The sign said that she was 8 months pregnant and homeless. She had a paper cup in her hand with some change in it. She was wearing a fall/winter coat and, honestly, she looked pregnant. Naturally, I asked "So, are you really pregnant?" She said "Yeah. You wanna see?" "Sure" I said. She unzipped her coat and lifted her shirt up above her very pregnant stomach. That was good enough for me. I said that I would help her and began to reach into my pocket. I knew that I had some canadian money in my left pocket. She began to explain that all she was really getting was change. She wasn't really making eye contact with me at this point and it was a little ackward for me too. I pulled out what was in my pocket, a $5 bill, and put it in her cup. "Well, at least now I can get on the subway" she said.

I asked her "What's your name?" "Angel", she said. "You know God loves you, right?" was what came out of my mouth next, I think. I'm trying to keep the chronology straight. Angel looked away toward the ground and said "Yeah...I know." Now, I'm not one to drop the old "You know God loves you, right?" but, I was desparately seeking to help her know that there is someone who does care about her even when it seems like no one even acknowledges her existence. I just wanted her to know that she was as valuable as anybody else.

I asked her if she had tried getting help. She told me that she didn't have an ID card and that it would cost $35.00 to replace. She rambled off some other details about complications in replacing the ID card. What happened next I could never have saw coming in a million years. "Can I have a hug?" As if I had no control over my speech, I blurted out "Okay." We reached out for each other at the same time and embraced. It felt more like I was holding her. "I haven't had a hug in over a year" followed next in a kind of quiverring tone. Now, she was crying. All I could do was hold her and pray for her. I didn't even know what to pray for and I don't think I can remember what I prayed.

After what seemed like forever, but was probably only 4o seconds, we let go of each other and I told her, again, that God loves her. "It probably doesn't seem like it right now but he does. I'll be praying for you and your baby." I began to walk away and she moved out of the main walking path on the sidewalk. About 30 steps later I looked back and she was gone. I walked back to meet up with Meredith. She was already outside of the store waiting for me. We decided that we were going to drive to The Eaton Centre, a shopping mall, and began to walk to the parking ramp where our car was. We were in the parking ramp and I was opening the door for Meredith when she asked me if I was okay. I guess it was obvious that something was wrong. I told her "No" as I closed the door and walked around the car to get in the driver's seat.

I explained to Meredith what had just happened while I was getting us coffee. I couldn't help but cry. I was upset. I still am. Meredith sat quietly and listened to me as I told her my story. She is pretty good at just being there, you know?

There are several things about this encounter that disturb me. The fact that right now, our loved ones are spending what will amount to thousands of dollars on baby shower items for Meredith, myself, and our baby. The fact that I feel completely unable to really help Angel and her coming child. The fact that as I was embracing Angel the thought crossed my mind that perhaps this was a ploy to steal my wallet or something of that nature. Of that I am ashamed. It wasn't. I guess it's difficult to let your guard down, even in a moment like that. How about not feeling the warmth of another's embrace in over a year?

There are times in your life, times marked by events, that you know without a shadow of a doubt have changed something about you permanently. This has been one of those times for me. The currently painful part is that I don't know what to do about it. I don't know what to do. I will pray for Angel. I hope you will too. Beyond that, I don't know. The shock of this encounter has left me numb.