I judged a woman by her flaming fox sweatshirt. Then she and her mother danced circles around me—literally—and taught me a lesson I didn’t know I needed.

Stranded on a dark San Francisco street, Mike slumped onto a stoop, looking less like a guy with motion sickness and more like someone who had lost a fight with a bottle of tequila. People crossed the street to avoid us. That’s when I realized: we weren’t just stuck—we were being judged.

I had spent four years being told what things are—cups are for drinking, saucers are for holding cups. But here was Grandma, breaking the rules in the quietest, most matter-of-fact way.

Maybe I wasn’t Jesus. Maybe no one is. Or maybe we all are—not as saviors, but as hands and feet, as hearts capable of kindness, as people who, in whatever small ways we can, bring light into the world.