I Guess Gullible's Not Really in the Dictionary

I have been duped for the first time since moving here. I mean beyond the average "There are eight children and a dog depending on me and I just lost my job as a chimney sweep" I mean really I fell for quite a line. This morning coming out of my apartment, I ran into a man on the street asking for cabfare. He claimed to be working in the costume department of Sweeney Todd and offered me free tickets if I could help him out, saying he had locked himself out of his apartment and had to go get an extra set of keys. So I gave him some money and my name and number and he said he would restore my faith in humanity.

Maybe I just have some deephearted sympathy for gay men in theater or something but I fell right for it. And gave him the last of my money for the week. All on this hope that he would return with Sweeney Todd tickets for me. It's actually a musical I really want to see so I'm excitd about it. Or at least I was. I wonder if he thought i had plenty of money. I can't imagine my Old Navy hoodie or worn keds would be screaming that but what do I know. I was clean and showered.

Then again maybe poor people just have more faith than others. Poor people are more likely to gamble, play the lottery, lend a hand or some cash, feed those with less than they have. I know that I alwasy give money to charity even though there are weeks where I can barely afford to eat! I'm also the type of person that buys meals for homeless people sometimes and can't stand the thought of a kid not getting school supplies. There are so many good things in the world and if we don't share them what kind of world are we living in? I understand that during the Depression rich people gripped their resources even tighter, forcing many to starve to death waiting for enough work to pay for a single meal. Unless they had a ton in the stock market, many of the wealthier people didn't even change their lives that much, maybe trading in a nice meal or two but certainly not waiting desperately in work lines for something, anything that would put water and bread on the crates that served as furniture. Reading the "Grapes of Wrath" I was amazed at the human condition, the willingness of one person to work for next to nothing while the wealthy kept getting wealthier. I loved those scenes when the cops ran people out of "camps" for enxt to no reason just because they had been paid off.

Now I'm poor, living in a depression of sorts. I have to be more careful with money than I ever was during college. It's crazy to thing that just a couple of years ago I assumed a college education would be all I would need to get a decent job. Now I'm realizing that isn't the case, at least not in the world of humanities. The glass ceiling still exists and to get out of it we have to look beyond what is going on in our heads.

My boyfriend was kind when I told him I had given all the money I had left to this man. He said "I hope the good karma means something".

Me, too.