How does it happen?

Written at three in the morning on the back of a Nissan ad I got in the mail. I couldn't sleep, and I was hungry. Next time, no Cheetos.

Have you ever sat in a mall? Just sat there, watching, and listening to humanity passing by, to Life going on around you? If you haven't then you don't know what you are missing. Seriously. We, as humans, tend to ignore humanity. I mean, how many of us can say we REALLY pay attention when those starving kids come on television to let us know that, for the price of a Latte, we can feed them for a month. I don't, but then, I have an honest reason. You see, while you may look at these commercials with dismay, and a bleeding heart, I am ever the critic. And I have discovered the real reason for such commercials to exist. We need them. That's right. Humanity needs them, though I'll admit some of us need them more than others.

You see the truth is this; we put the commercials out so that children can starve. "WHAT?!?!?!", you say "Not true!". Actually it is.

Here is how it plays out. A 38 year old telecommunications flunky is watching television late at night while his marketing executive wife, and his 2.4 kids are asleep in their beds deep within their 6 bedroom brownstone. Daddy just got another raise but can't shake the feeling that he has missed something, when all of a sudden, WHAM, a little, starving African boy named Saggi, or something, is on the tube. Right there in his living room is his shot at redemption for the price of a Latte. Of course he will sponsor a child! Oh, AND you take plastic? Oh, AND it's a tax write-off? Please let me sponsor 2!!

And on his way to work the next morning, he won't even notice that woman asking for change. Won't notice how threadbare her clothes are, or how they just kind of hang, somewhat lopsidedly. And you know he's not going to notice that, right here in America, 6 blocks from home, 50 feet 17 floors down from his office, 2 small children are watching their mother, praying that she comes back with enough money for the toast.

And he won't have to because he's done his part. He has saved a life, allowed a child to live. So he has to throw away an extra piece of mail on holidays.

And he even gets a Latte.