Louisville Magazine is Louisville's city magazine, covering Louisville people, lifestyles, politics, sports, restaurants, entertainment and homes. Includes a monthly calendar of events.
Issue link: https://loumag.epubxp.com/i/250528
bit the Illustration by Carrie Neumayer The temperature read zero on the car's dashboard. Zero degrees. That would be the high on this frst Monday of the year. It was 8:35 in the morning. The intersection of First Street and Muhammad Ali Boulevard downtown was a movie set of car exhaust billowing into the icy air, of workaday stragglers hidden under scarves and wool caps and overcoats, speed-walking to the offce. We sat in the car, cursing the overworked heater for not working harder and waiting impatiently to turn, angry that we didn't beat a red light. So close to the damn offce. On the sidewalk, on the south side of Ali, a man leaned in a frozen crouch against a brick building. He wore no coat, no hat, and his tattered dark-blue pants stopped raggedly mid-calf, exposing his dark skin to the elements. He was obviously homeless. The wind picked up. We stared at the man, our minds trying to make sense of the scene, when a muted-gold sedan pulled to the curb. A woman scampered out, beetle-bugging her way across the sidewalk toward the man. We didn't see her face. She had a blanket. She approached him and, without appearing to say a word, draped it over his hunched shoulders. For a moment, he looked like one of those old-time football players wearing an oversized cape over pads on the sideline at Lambeau Field, the lonely warrior in the twilight of a career. The man was big. Bigger than she was. Well over six feet. His thick beard had gone white in contrast to his skin. He didn't have the energy to pull the blanket tighter, so she hugged him with it, led him to her car, which looked warm, which looked safe. They got in. She drove away. There are anonymous moments in life that never seem to fade away. If you're lucky, they change you. Just a little. We were blessed to start our year with one. We love that woman. We love the man she helped. We don't know if our modern-day Samaritan saved a life that morning — perhaps he had an inevitable appointment in Samaria; we all do — but we do know that, in a small but not insignifcant way, she changed one. — Kane Webb WELOVE www.redcross.org/louisville 18 LOUISVILLE MAGAZINE 2.14