A few days ago, I was waiting for a gap in traffic to make a right turn when a woman I didn't know walked up to my car, waving. She looked distressed.
I cracked my window open two inches, letting in a blast of icy air, and turned down the radio. My car won't start and I need to get to work, she began. I almost immediately stopped listening to her story as I began thinking about whether I would give her any money when she inevitably asked for ten dollars for gas.
She didn't ask for money. She asked for a ride to work at the Walgreens on Lake Street. I know exactly where that is. It's about twelve blocks away, a walk of about two miles, which is not really all that far if it's not freezing cold and you're not late for work.
I had my two kids in the car. I looked at her. She was clearly distressed. She had no hat, no gloves. She was clutching a day planner. She did not look dangerous in any way whatsoever.
I said, I'm sorry. I can't take someone in my car when I have my kids in the car.
She said, I know, I understand, I have a twelve-year-old son. I have a picture --- she started to open her planner --- let me show you ---
I said, I can't take anyone I don't know in my car. I'm sorry. I wish I could help. There's a police car on the next block. I saw it back there.
She was near tears. Do you know where I could find a phone to call a cab?
I remembered I had a cell phone. Can I call you a cab?
Do you have a cell phone? She told me a telephone number, not needing to pause to look it up. I dug my phone out of my pocket and called the number.
"Hello, Red Cab taxi service." She knew the taxi phone number from memory? I sure don't know any taxi cab numbers from memory. I don't have to. I told the dispatcher that a woman was stranded at a particular street corner. The dispatcher told me to tell her to walk a block south to a particular convenience store parking lot and the cab could pick her up there. So I did, and she thanked me, and she started walking, and I closed my window and turned right and drove past her as she hurried down the sidewalk.
Gentle Reader, you know what is bothering me: shouldn't I have given her the ride?
In retrospect, I'm nearly certain that she was not misrepresenting herself.
In retrospect, I could have asked to see her I.D. and used my cell phone to call my husband, or a friend, and report: I am giving a woman a lift. This is her name, this is her address. I will call you back in ten minutes, after I have dropped her off at the Walgreens on Lake Street.
As I recount this incident, I am struck especially by the I have a twelve-year-old son. What I hear in that now is one mother, appealing to another for help, in the name of motherhood. Gavin de Becker writes in his excellent book about personal safety, The Gift of Fear,
I encourage women to ask other women for help when they need it, and it's likewise safer to accept an offer from a woman than from a man. (Unfortunately, women rarely make such offers to other women, and I wish more would.)
Although I did assist her, I could have gone much farther, and I did not --- not actually because I feared that if I took her into my car, she might harm meor my children, but rather because conventional rules of safety dictate that I do not pick up strangers.
Did I in that moment fail to serve Christ?
Anyone?
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