Wavering Humanity

On my way home from work I had to stop & get gas. After I was setting up the gas pump, another car pulled into the station. A man got out & very nicely started asking me if I could spare any money b/c his ex wife called him & he has to go get his kid in Long Beach and only has a dollar on him for gas. I have a tendency to never give people money. I'm not really sure why, but I just don't. I've given people food, etc, but rarely ever money. It could be because I'm not sure if some of the people asking really need it, or because I know how quickly it goes. And so my initial reaction to him was, I'm sorry, I just can't. He was a decent looking person. He asked around other people at the gas station. I'm not really sure if he was able to get money or not, but when he went back to his car & started to get gas, I was getting into my car and looked at him. He said, $4.13. Embarrassing. ($4.13 being the cost of gas at this station at this time.) I said to him, it's alright.

As I got into my car, I started thinking why did I say that? It's not alright to him. I don't mind him asking for money, but he must be embarrassed asking for it. Now I feel bad. He may or may not have a kid that he has to go pick up in the middle of the night, but the more I thought about him, the more I believed him. Unfortunately, I had left the gas station. I usually don't feel bad not giving strangers money, but I started thinking about all the hard times we had growing up, not having money & how that $5 I could have given this guy could have been just a blip to me but a lifesaver to him at this moment. After all, of all the times I go to get gas, this one time, at this particular station, this is the moment where someone seemingly needs help and being able to, I don't. Why?