Tears

We are at 6.9% unemployment in Michigan right now.
The City of Detroit is probably much worse than that, but the statistics don't say. Detroiters I talk to claim it's more like 10%.
Even in Suburbia, where I work, I have people begging for change to ride the bus home at night. They took the bus to the mall to stay warm for the day, and are begging for change to get back to the shelter or worse, an abandoned building somewhere. I am a sucker I guess, because I usually give someone change.
The worst scenario was a teenage girl with 2 babies that had a lovely couple offer to hold the shrieking 2 year old, so she could feed the infant. She looked about 17. The same couple then drove her and her babies to God knows where, because she had to leave. We were closing.She was there alone. Someone dropped her off.
We had a homeless man in our neighborhood, we called Chicken Man, because of his rooster-like strut. We've fed him and given him blankets. We never see him anymore. I prefer to think he's somewhere being cared for, but the reality is that he froze to death or just died for some other reason.
There is a young man that walks door-to-door in the summer, offering to mow lawns for $5 just to get something to eat. We mow our grass, but I offer him a sandwich and cold drink.
I HATE what this state has become. I rarely allow myself the luxury of crying, but I have cried over this. Part of the tears, I confess, is a fear of becoming the very people I grieve for. I am one check away from this, I know all too well.

UPDATE: New statistics on Michigan are unemployment at 7.1%, the highest in the nation,and we have lost over 30,000 jobs in the last 3 years. Last person leaving,please turn off the lights.