MY NIGHT AT NEW YORK PENN STATION WITH THE HOMELESS
Where
is the gift in this?
It was midnight US Eastern time, however my
mind and body told me the time was 5 a.m. as I had just landed in New York from
Iceland. I was on my way to Washington DC where I was booked to speak at the
National Association of Women Business Owners (NAWBO) National Conference the
following morning. My trip
had not exactly started as planned.
It started with a delayed arrival from Iceland, causing me to lose my
connecting flight. My only option
to make it to Washington DC in time for my speaking engagements was to take the
train. The second flip…mistake… event, whatever we want to call it, to delay my
trip, was when I missed the train station I was supposed to go to catch my
train to Washington D.C.
Tired and extremely frustrated at myself
for making that mistake, finally I arrived at Penn Station, only to find out
that I had missed the midnight train to Washington D.C. and that the next train
was not expected to depart till 4 a.m. that morning. With my train ticket in one hand, my luggage in the
other, I sat down in the main entrance hall of Penn Station, still could not
believe I had screwed things up so badly.
As I thought about my situation, my 4 hour wait ahead, my concern to be
able to deliver my speech the following day, arriving in DC only few hours
before I should be on stage, a question popped up in my mind, several
times. The question was: ”Runa,
where is the gift in this moment?” Yeah, well, it sounded more like “Where is the so called gift in this
moment?”
As I tried to come to terms with my
situation and figure out “the gift in that moment” a group of police officers
entered the main hall at Penn Station and asked everybody to evacuate the
building. They were ready to close the building for the night. As I looked
around, I realized I was sitting with the homeless people of New York, and the
police were escorting everybody out of the station. People slowly moved out of the station. I was terrified… “WHAT!? It’s cold and dark and I don’t have any place to go to in
New York! How am I going to catch
the 4 a.m. train if I’m not even allowed to be inside Penn Station?” I turned to one of the police officer
with my question, and he guided me to wait in a special waiting room by the
platform. “Uff… “That was a relief
I thought. Then I looked around me,
I noticed that many of my “new friends” of New York (the homeless people) knew
about the waiting rooms and accompanied me into the warm waiting-room.
As they entered the waiting room, they
quietly lay on the wooden benches (which all had a sign saying only for people
with valid train tickets) and fell asleep. I however was determined that despite the time difference and
long travel, I was going to stay wide awake till my train would arrive. Still frustrated…and amazed by this
situation I was in, I kept asking myself the question: “Where is the gift in
this? Where is the gift in this situation? Why am I here?”
The night came, and soon I noticed there
was a certain pattern of activities that took place inside that waiting
room. My new homeless friends who
had found a place to sleep around me, only got about 1 hour of sleep, as the
police officers came regularly and quietly touched their shoulder… the sleepy
homeless person looked up… quietly stood up and moved out… as this happened, a
new homeless person came into my waiting room… fell asleep, and in about 1 hour
a pair of two police officers entered… quietly touched their shoulders… and the
same routine started.
As I watched this routine of quiet work
from the police officers, and quiet acceptance from the homeless the biggest,
most amazing, overwhelming “gift in the moment” appeared to me. I felt the feeling of
respect. Deep meaningful
respect. I felt the respect that
was in the air. I felt the respect
the police officers (who were just doing their jobs) showed the homeless,
despite their situation, a respect that was clearly reciprocated by the
homeless. This experience gave me
a new feeling of how we are all connected and told me how all human beings, in
all aspects of life have deep desire to give respect and be respected.
My night at New York Penn Station was a
true gift. It made me vulnerable,
and at the same time deeply grateful for being able to witness and feel the
mutual respect between human beings, a mutual respect which is so fundamentally
important in human relations.
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