Angel

Just after 9/11, I had to fly to Atlanta for a meeting. It was very late on a Wednesday night when my plane arrived. My nerves were shot from having to fly back then. No sooner had I gotten my luggage than I found myself riding a train across the dark city to a place I’d never been before. As late as it was, the train was packed. You could tell the locals from the tourists. The locals had this thousand-mile stare of boredom in their eyes. I had this deer-in-the-headlight look staring at maps and signs hoping not to spend the night riding loops around Atlanta.

Even with maps and signs, I was still so very lost. At one point, a woman sat down beside me. Early thirties, Eastern descent. Pakistani, Iranian, Palestinian, maybe. Easy to profile with suspicion in those days. She was reading a technical paper, not that I was looking. She and I were also observing the unwritten rule that you don’t talk to strangers in the city on the train. I was so lost. I bet I smelled nervous.

Leap-frogging the unwritten rule that men don’t ever ask directions, I asked her for help. And, she gave it, very generously. She told me where to get off the train (not the first person to ever do that). When I got off, she stopped to point to the elevator that led from the loading platform to the street. She’d seen my luggage and knew the stairs would be too much.

I took the elevator. It opened up to a very dark and spooky place. Not the kind of place you want to be alone late at night looking so very much like a tourist. To my surprise, about thirty yards away, was my angel of the night was standing, waiting. She’d taken the stairs and gotten there first. When I came off of the elevator she pointed me toward the street, where my ride was waiting. Then, she walked into the darkness, like an actress exiting stage left, and I never saw her again.

I never knew her name. She didn’t owe me that extra bit of help. Why did she stop and help? Had she been lost once and someone waited on her? Someone who knew that signs and maps, rules of the road, can never substitute for a real human being who cares enough just to take a moment to show you the way. That you need rules but you also need hope.

A crowded train in the city. A person of Middle-Eastern descent. In my suspicions, I could have just written her off as not worth trusting. As it turned out, the very one I was tempted to judge was my personal angel, the one who knew the way and even cared enough to stop and give me hope.

It is true. Sometimes we welcome angels unaware. Sometimes, they welcome us. You just never know.