The Good Samaritan

lazy self-indulgent writer watches less fortunate people work in the hot sun.

Much of my day is spent in my air-conditioned apartment, watching other men work in the hot sun outside. They’re preparing the site for a new building, possibly spoiling my view from this one. One man, driving a bulldozer, does the greatest amount of earth moving, but there is a team of men with shovels digging a trench along the edge of the sidewalk in a place too narrow and delicate for the big machine.

 

I’m listening to a Bach oratorio on YouTube. Thank God they finally got the Internet connection fixed here; it certainly took them long enough. The work day begins very early here. Most people are at work by seven. The real heat has not kicked in yet, but I can see the men at the shovels are wiping their faces. They wear long-sleeved shirts as a protection against the sun.

 

I guess I’m “working” too, though my only jobs have involved staring at a computer screen and pecking away at a keyboard. Now that I’m not longer working in offices, I don’t have to dress up. Today I am not only minus a dress shirt and tie but am shirtless.

 

In my years of living in “developing economies,” I’ve noticed that those who don’t share my comforts live a much different life than do I.

 

Those of us who don’t work in the sun do our best to protect themselves from its rays, and at least female white people of leisure often sunbathe to lend their skin a healthy bronze hue. People with darker skin avoid the sun if possible. Females of that ilk often buy skin-lightening creams, which have been proven to be carcinogenic, but such is the power of mass-marketing on a global scale. Blame television or movies, but it seems the world is convinced you can never be too white.

 

Peering through my tinted windows I see that the shovelers have a thermos of cool water to share between them, but I imagine they’ll run through that in a short while. I find an old two-liter soda bottle and fill it with tap water, placing it in the refrigerator. I’ll bring it to them in a while, careful not to expect gratitude for my small gesture.

 

I return to my “work,” but after a while the thought of them out there digging in the hot sun makes me go to the refrigerator and start to drink some of the newly cooled water I had prepared to give them.  Even though I’m not actually sweating, or thirsty, I find myself compelled to gulp down cup after cup of chilled tap water. Call me “co-dependent,” but every time I look out the window, my thirst returns.

 

I concentrate for a half-hour or so, editing a piece I wrote years ago. What had I been thinking I was accomplishing back then? No wonder publishers resisted my every attempt to garner their attention. When I look out the window, I see the men are still shoveling. For the first time I notice that they don’t work very quickly, and seem to stand around talking as much as they shovel, but I have to hand it to them, they’re willing to endure what would send me to bed for the rest of the day, after taking a cold shower and cranking up the AC.

 

I’m done with that piece and move onto another, which I remember fondly as being some of my best work, but now upon closer inspection seems to be the writing of a self-centered adolescent, full of grandiosity and self-pity in equal measure. When I look out the window again, the men are working even more slowly, taking turns going through the motions of digging, while the others stand dumbly watching traffic whiz by. At the most, one person works at a time, the others leaning on their shovels and looking around. No wonder nothing ever seems to get done in this country!

 

I take another drink of the cool water and realize that I’ve consumed most of the bottle. No wonder I’ve been making so many trips to the bathroom! Well, too late to give it to the men outside. It will take a while to chill another bottle. Besides, in between struggling with my past literary efforts and watching these men loaf at their work has made me tired. I’ll fill the bottle again and put it back in the refrigerator. Maybe I’ll bring it to them this afternoon, though they’ll probably be on siesta by then. These people think nothing of taking two to four hours off every afternoon. No wonder they never get anywhere in this country!