So it goes...

This morning I went to the Starbucks across the street from my office to get my morning "usual": a doppio espresso and a pumpkin scone. I sat down at the counter next to the barista's area and noticed this scruffy looking fellow a couple of bar stools over from me. He was yapping away about something and I ended up catching wind of what he was saying. He'd been given a ticket for riding the train without a ticket and had been threatened with jail if caught again. In between that he was complaining about being homeless and having been slapped with a ticket for panhandling. I just lent him a sympathetic ear though he was tending to get a bit too vocal. Ruby, the store manager tried to get her message across to him that his conduct wasn't the best but he seemed to be in a state where he just wanted someone to listen to him. He complained back to her that he needed to get downtown but he had a load to carry. If anything he wasn't in the best of moods.

Anyways, I headed out of the shop and before I got to the crosswalk I remembered I had some left over "FareSaver" transit tickets left in my backpack. I'm not about to use them this month because I've purchased a monthly transit pass. When I got back to my desk I took my jacket off, logged back onto my computer, took a bite out of my scone and still couldn't get the idea of the unused transit tickets out of my head. So I said to myself "What the heck!", grabbed the tickets, put on my jacket and went back out towards the Starbucks. I found the fellow complaining to a woman at the bus stop about his predicament. I went up to him, tapped him on the shoulder, handed him the partial booklet of tickets and told he could have them. I didn't have any use for them.

And so it goes... To me the idea of slapping several hundred dollars of fines for transit fare evasion on a homeless person (who I suspect may be an outpatient from a mental health institution) is a touch farcical. That sort of punishment should be dealt out to the kids who think they're being so clever by cheating the system. Or the "normal" folks who think nothing of boarding a train without paying the fare. Whatever. That was the situation and that was what I did. I don't particularly care if it was the right thing or not. All I did was take action.