The Sound of Solidarity

The journey of meaningful donation.

Illustration by Alabaster Pizzo

Walking down Amsterdam Avenue on a recent sunny Saturday afternoon, I was on the lookout for someone I could give twenty bucks to. I surveyed some candidates.

One, a disheveled man in a grimy overcoat, was fishing through a garbage can near Chirping Chicken on 77th Street. He flipped all the contents into a bag, gave them a quick once-over, and then dumped everything back in, minus a few bottles and a magazine he picked out. He repeated the same routine at another can. I considered giving him my 20 dollars, but I didn’t want to risk offense. (He was clearly just doing his thing and could have been confused or put off by such a gesture, I thought.) I decided it would be easier to find someone who was openly asking for funding.

Such as, for instance, a young blonde woman sitting on 63rd and Broadway in front of Starbucks in a T-shirt and tattered jeans with a donation cup and a cardboard sign in her lap that read, “A little kindness goes a long way.” She loo…