...and they laughed...

So I was taking the train back up to Loyola tonight, and the strangest thing happened. A man came onto the train car that I was on, as seems to happen so often, and he started asking us for our attention "Attention ladies and gentlemen, please, your attention please" he said. However, usually when people do this it is because they are announcing that they were convicted felons and are telling us that they just "need a few bucks to get a tie" as they usually say. This guy, wasn't doing that though, this guy was selling art. Some of it was stuff he had put together, or done, himself, some of it was published collections, and most importantly he was selling his poetry for "only a dollar", but... I couldn't afford it, I honestly couldn't even give this man a dollar for his poetry, because I didn't have even that, because I am a broke college student who's annual outflow of money is higher than probably 65% of the population's income. The worst part wasn't the fact that I couldn't help him, the worst part was that this guy was just trying to sell something that we could all use a little more of in our lives and they laughed – the people on the train openly mocked him, and I did nothing. I can really relate to this guy, though, this guy who's just trying to make an honest living selling art, and nobody gives a shit, and actually, actively dislikes him for it, that freaking sucks. Sometimes, if you can't get a job all you have left is your art, and if no one is willing to buy what you create, what do you have left?