Tonight I helped a blind man get off the subway. He asked me which way the exit was and I told him that it was either way. He said the closer one. It happened to be the way I was going.
I led him out of the subway, wondering if it was easy to traverse a city with a walking stick. As I was guiding his arm, it occurred to me that maybe, every once in awhile, it might be nice to relax and trust a kind voice to lead you somewhere. It has to be exhausting not to be able to see. Things you take for granted.
He left me on the corner of 57th and 7th Avenue. He was going left, I was going right. And he just walked away. No goodbye. Nothing. Just walked away and disappeared into the crowd oblivious to the fact that the entire sidewalk full of bystanders was staring at him.
And I stood on the corner and started to cry. I didn’t really know why, but I was so sad watching him go. I wanted to ask him questions; he trusted me, he couldn’t see my face, my eyes, but he trusted me. I wondered if it was my voice, or if, in a situation like his, you are just apt to trust people.
Then I thought about how lucky he was for that fact. I could barely learn to trust people after years. This man without his vision can trust people after just a moment of guidance.
And so I came home and for the first time in my life I wrote a song about a stranger.
