The Contributor- Community

The Contributor is changing people’s lives by bringing together a community. Not only with a vendor and customer relationship but also with all types of people that walk by, drive by or interact in some sort of way with the vendors. Selling the Contributor is not merely about making money and providing a source of income, but also includes the relationship and interactions with people.  Approaching an old lady by the name of Pat Reeves, standing on the street corner, looked overjoyed with a smile that would light up anybody’s bad day. Seeming friendly from a distance, she was not very happy and completely turned off by the idea of being interviewed.  She stood there not knowing how to react. Like a hermit crab, she crawled into her hard shell for protection. She was quite frightened by me and my camera and my desire to get personal with her. Kindly enough, after feeling a little more comfortable, she allowed me to ask her a few questions. She would not allow me to record the conversation because she had never experienced anything like that before. The answers where short and to the point but focused directly toward the community that she has built.  It was the only thing that she really wanted to share with me. Pat is not homeless anymore but continues to sell the paper because of the people that she encounters daily. With a smiling face, Pat is sure to grab a stranger’s attention. The Pat that I first encountered, the one where she was a hermit crab crawling into her shell, completely changed when a lady that must work in the building Pat was standing next to walked by. The lady yelled, “Hello Pat, How are you?”  Pat’s face lights up and she waves back to the lady. I could tell that relationships formed like that really meant something special to Pat. It is why she continues to stand there on the corner of 3^rd and Commerce in downtown Nashville everyday.  

There is so much importance about building a special and unique community when selling the Contributor. It is also just as important for the customers to those venders to be willing to develop a community with them. After reading a book called City Streets City People by Michael J. Christensen, my eyes were open to how individuals should learn to understand the homeless community. Christensen says, “To know and love the poor, we must journey with them. To journey with the poor means to go and live among them; to seek to understand their needs, hopes, and dreams; to walk a few miles in their shoes, to learn from them and suffer with them; to go what can be done” (74).  There is so much truth in these words.  From an outsider of homelessness, being a part of this culture is advertently difficult.  To have the audacity and strength to put yourself into that role is excruciatingly complicated.  There are certain lines that you cannot cross and words that you should not speak. I tend to feel like there is this huge wall separating my life from their life. Sometimes, it seems impossible to ever try to jump over. We are missing out on the community and the personalities of these individuals that could be developed if only we are brave enough to conquer this fear. Community is a strong word. It is something that is powerful in relationships. The thing that continues to keep Pat motivated is that community and the friendships brought by selling the Contributor. If this paper did not exist, the homeless community would not be the same. This simple way of helping the homeless would be gone and there would be a detachment from this community.  As a customer to this paper, I have the role and responsibility to adapt and understand their culture and invest in these individuals to form a community.