{"id":585,"date":"2011-08-22T22:30:26","date_gmt":"2011-08-23T02:30:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.marklydecker.com\/?p=585"},"modified":"2011-08-22T22:33:23","modified_gmt":"2011-08-23T02:33:23","slug":"give-a-little-extra","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.marklydecker.com\/?p=585","title":{"rendered":"Give A Little Extra"},"content":{"rendered":"

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\"\"\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0It is rare when I travel on the\u00a0Atlanta Marta train<\/a>\u00a0and am not asked for a quarter or dollar bill. \u00a0When I first began to ride the train to the airport, I would not give anyone a handout…just like everyone else on the train. \u00a0I think we all pretty much felt like they were moochers who would just buy booze or drugs. \u00a0Then one day I saw it differently.<\/p>\n

One day a woman entered the train who was poorly dressed, had terrible body odor, and constantly mumbled. \u00a0Before me I saw a terribly poor woman begging for funds and it was obvious that she was mentally incompetent and tossed out on the street because few if anyone cared for her. \u00a0But rather than be repulsed by her, I got a sudden vision of the needs of this poor woman and every beggar I have seen after her. \u00a0These are people in need. \u00a0People who are mentally ill, have made terrible life decisions, have dysfunctional families, and are non-hirable to name a few things about them. \u00a0They may be seen as a drain on society, but they are people…made in the image of God.<\/p>\n

Now I try to carry dollar bills with me on Marta and give them out as possible. \u00a0They may buy drugs or booze but they do have to eat sometime. \u00a0Next time you are on the train…share a dollar or two with someone in need. \u00a0You will never miss a few dollars but it may make all the difference in someone’s life.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

  \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0It is rare when I travel on the\u00a0Atlanta Marta train\u00a0and am not asked for a quarter or dollar bill. \u00a0When I first began to ride the train to the airport, I would not give anyone a handout…just like everyone else on the train. \u00a0I think we all pretty much felt like […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[21,16],"tags":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.marklydecker.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/585"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.marklydecker.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.marklydecker.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.marklydecker.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.marklydecker.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=585"}],"version-history":[{"count":13,"href":"https:\/\/www.marklydecker.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/585\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":597,"href":"https:\/\/www.marklydecker.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/585\/revisions\/597"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.marklydecker.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=585"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.marklydecker.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=585"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.marklydecker.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=585"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}