Two days ago, when I arrived in Tarifa (Spain), he was on the bench. I didn’t notice at first, dismissing him as just another “hipster” with a backpack. Nothing unusual here.
Yesterday, he was still on the same bench. This time, I approached, and my sense of smell was instantly assaulted. That’s when I understood.
Since last night, there has been a severe weather alert; it’s been raining, and the wind has been blowing fiercely. On the ocean shore, when the wind blows and there’s a storm, your head usually pounds, and it’s incredibly cold.
This morning, I found him still here, sleeping.
Left him some hot food and a cup of hot coffee. We tried to communicate, but we hit a language barrier. I couldn’t understand if he was from Czech Republic, Poland… something along those lines.
My heart broke. I’ve often wondered, how much trauma, how much pain can exist in a person’s life, to bring them to this stage? To leave them unable to rise from there, no matter what?
Dozens of questions ran through my head. Did he once have “another life”? Was his childhood like this too? Or maybe he had a normal life, and at some point, something happened. Maybe he has parents or a family somewhere, wondering about him. Or maybe he has no one. These are just parts of the story.
I have no idea. And so, there are probably millions of similar stories in the world.
Stories we know nothing about, or maybe we pass by but don’t care. Maybe we shouldn’t care, we could say.
This whole situation reminded me of the increasingly superficial world we live in. A world built more on appearances and less on humanity. A world where there is a lot of judgment and less love.
A world where we easily label and forget that behind those labels, there are still people. Each with their own life story. With their traumas, dreams, failures, achievements, emotions.
A world where people fight for power, whether it’s about who takes more from the market, who has more followers, or about wars in which tens of thousands of people die, who maybe didn’t want a power struggle.
Less of a world where people build together. Less of a world where we care.
It’s just a reminder, for me and for anyone who resonates with this: let’s not forget to be, at least from time to time, human beings.
