A Rainbow of Help for a Motorist in Trouble : Can a brief encounter change racial attitudes?

He flung his fists in exasperation as he stood helpless next to his large, older-model Buick, stalled at a busy Fairfax intersection in West Hollywood.

He was white and around my age, in his 30s. Gathering his composure, he opened the door, turned the steering wheel with his right hand and with his left hand on the door frame, he pushed the car along with the bulk of his body. The car moved a few inches, then halted. Cars whizzed by; some drivers gave him an irritated honk. The traffic light turned red. Pedestrians flowed around the man and his stalled car.

As I approached the crosswalk, my first response to the dilemma was, “I’m tired. I’ve only had four hours’ sleep. Surely someone else will stop.” Once again, he began the process of steering the car wheel with the right and pushing the car with the left as cars driven by people who looked just like him continued to pass him by. Again, the car stopped. Another red light. A new group of pedestrians continued around him.

I know how it feels to have a car stop on you: the frustration, the helplessness. Once, driving with my mother from Illinois to California, my car stalled in a highway rest area in Arkansas. My mother suggested I stop a black man leaving the rest room to see if he had jumper cables. He did not. A white man, leaving with a group, overheard us and volunteered to help. He spent the next 15 minutes doing that, while his family waited. He didn’t ask me about my racial views or whether I had any white friends. I was a traveler stalled at a rest stop. Helpless. Just like this man standing at the intersection.

“Need a hand?” I asked.

“Yeah.”

Another black man walking down the sidewalk moved to give us a hand. I don’t know whether he stopped because he saw two people struggling or whether my participation made it OK to help this white man. As we pushed his car to the side of the road, a Latino man driving a truck asked if he could help and offered to push the car to the gas station.

“But I don’t have any money.”

“It’s OK. I don’t want any.”

Surprised, the owner of the car thanked us and got behind the wheel. As the truck pushed the car down the street, I continued down the sidewalk.

The rainbow coalition in action. Of the 30 or so people who witnessed the predicament--most of them white--two blacks and a Latino stopped to help. The car owner’s color was secondary. There was no time to ask him what his racial views were. I didn’t know whether he had black friends or whether his sympathies lie with David Duke and the Klan. I did know that the act of pushing a stalled car to the side of the road was too much for one man.

I wonder what will happen when the Buick owner finds himself approaching a stalled motorist. Will he give assistance no matter who needs it? If he’s with friends and viewing the news and the discussion turns to violent and lazy blacks and Latinos always in search of some favor from the government, will he remember the simple act of kindness from three strangers?