Selfish Ambition

Tonight I went to the grocery store. I saw there a little man, hunched forward with age in a well used body. It has been raining all day and he wore a coat, a rain coat, despite the cold air. I couldn't help but watch him as he picked up a box of chocolates.  I got distracted and looked away and without another thought, carried on with my shopping. I heard two people, I think a mother and daughter, calculating food costs...a group of three young university aged kids spoke about how cheap potatoes are.  In the last isle of the store, yet another couple compared prices and looked for the best buy, store flyer in hand. There was the little man, my attention was again drawn to him. He had in his cart toilet paper and paper towel, not one food item and definitely no pot of gold chocolate box.  As I walked tonight, rain pouring down, I wept and thought of "upward mobility", words I haven't heard in quite some time. It occurred to me that they are words that disguise empty selfish ambition. If I am upwardly mobile, than I can not see those around me for fear that I am them. What good is all I have, all I accumulate, if I have not love for my fellow man?  Oh selfish ambition, how dare you threaten my love for humanity.