Most of us are quite sensitive about the plight of homeless people in our neighborhoods, but many of us get tired of seeing the same hand out every day after we put something in it the first time, so we start looking the other way and passing on by, maybe even crossing the street to avoid the heavy hustling spots staked out by the more aggressive panhandlers.

Of course a few of the regular beggars are well worth a pittance from time to time, and we get to know them quite well. For instance, I knew Charles, who worked Wilson''s on West 79th. And he worked it hard too, opening car doors, cracking a big smile at approaching customers and so on, but despite his nightly work habit he just could not hold a regular job taking out the garbage or some such menial task. He knocked down $50 panhandling each evening on the average, or so he said. I got an inkling that he smoked crack, but he never dealt drugs as far as I know. Sometimes he had a few items for sale: lighters, pens, key chains, stuff like that, and by the gross too, fresh off a loading dock somewhere, I supposed. Charles and his gal lived in the subway.

One bitterly cold night, right after a big Florida hurricane, I asked Charles why he didn''t head to a Florida disaster shelter and claim he and his woman had been rendered homeless by the big blow, then apply for work to clean up the mess and rebuild the subdivisions. "No," he, said, shivering and stamping his feet, "I love New York. This is my home."

New Yorkers know what he was talking about. And, hey, some of them are mighty generous, too. A friend of mine who was really flush got off on being charitable. Yes, Jack was always poised to give a handout: he would gladly lay a fiver on anybody, whoever asked the first time, but that time was it. Me, I''m ashamed to say I was a cheapskate in comparison. I was homeless on the street a couple of years prior and had only managed to get back on my feet by working at minimum wage and by being extremely frugal with the proceeds - minimum wage does not get you off the street, you know. So when I heard the panhandler''s pitch, "But by the grace of God, you could be broke like me," I was not prone to forking over more than a quarter, if anything at all. I knew a number of outright cons too. Like the fellow who was crippled on the job but who straightened up and jumped over the subway turnstile with his crutches when he got off work. And I recall the young man who ran desperately up to people early in the morning as they were going to work, crying that his wife had just been killed and that he needed cab fare to the morgue. And there''s more, but never mind.

By the way, if you don''t get out of the New York City regularly, you are likely to go nuts. I finally managed to save enough money for a big vacation: three days in Richmond. I arrived downtown at 6 PM, took a look around and grew very apprehensive because the streets were desolate - deserted means dangerous where I came from. To compound my misgivings for choosing Richmond as my retreat, I heard it had just won the Murder Capital of the Year Award. But the town turned out to be cool: I learned the burbs had become the place to be, so people got into their cars and split when they got off work, except for the very few who stayed around for the happy hours. And they were happy indeed, with scads of free food - that just is not done in the city since the cockroaching crowd would bankrupt any fool who put out such a spread every evening. I also noted plenty of cops around Richmond; they came into the bars not to drink but to check them out and to chit chat with folks; I saw I was being observed as a stranger, and I was glad of it.

Anyhow, I got up the next morning and was walking towards the river when a big black man approached me. He had a cast on his right arm and a brown paper-bagged quart of beer in his left hand. I thought, "Finally, home at last! Here comes a panhandler!" Boy, was I ever mistaken. As I stood there feeling like a generous tourist, clutching a whole big dollar in my pocket in anticipation for the inevitable request, the man spoke, "Son," he said respectfully, showing me the unopened quart of beer in the bag, "could you help me out and screw this here lid off? I can''t use both hands." That is all the man wanted, and after I graciously complied, he offered me the first swig.

Now then, why did I think of that man just now, and where was I going? Oh, yes, I wound up in Honolulu a few years later and something brought all this to mind just yesterday when I sat down in Honolulu''s Stadium Park with some candy and a copy of Hobbes'' LEVIATHAN to distract me from the monotony of the perfect weather. No sooner had I turned to the ''Of Common-wealth'' chapter, a man approached and asked me if he could share the bench.

"Of course," I said, scooted over and observed that he was a big black man about 30-years of age, wearing a funky tie-dye outfit, head covered with a silk bandana, carrying a brown paper bag with a quart of beer in it. He sat down and complained he''d just gotten out of the hospital. Well, I had not learned my lesson in Richmond: you know what profile came to mind. But, hey, chill, this is Hawaii. And like they say in Jamaica, show respect, then say ''yes'' or ''no.''

So we shot the breeze. Hospital for what? A cyst. Me too, I have one like that but it doesn''t bother me enough to pay $5,000 including the operating room charge to get it fixed. No such problem for him: he said his doctor did it in the side room, saying the O.R. was too expensive. Watch out with the beer, I advised, since I had seen three cops swoop in on a guy a few days before no sooner had he unscrewed his bottle, I kid you not.

My acquaintance said he was waiting for his woman who works at the library by the park. That''s cool, I said, and realized I had mis-profiled him. He was on the Big Island doing construction, he said, and made out well, but it was too boring and wet around Volcano, so here he is on Oahu, thinking about going back to Las Vegas via L.A.

Yeah, Honolulu is a drag for me too despite the weather, I noted, as it is really hard to be white man and get a decent job. Security jobs can be had, he suggested, they''ll take almost anybody for $10 an hour. And he said knows how haoles are discriminated against, how haole is the "h" word in these parts. Well, it''s not like the "n" word I admitted, and I get along with the working class locals, in fact it''s business people who are so uptight, especially the haole ones, but still the silent racism is heavy. He agreed.

More chitchat. He can''t quit smoking. I did quit smoking and drinking, but it was hard, I boasted. Then, as he relished his beer, I licked my lips and recalled that when I got really pissed in New York, I used to drink beer on the Riverside Park promenade and listen to Ice-T, the really violent stuff, pretend I was a brother in the hood, and I felt lots better, but Cool J was the best man. His too! We exchanegd notes about city life, L.A. and New York, and about women in general. He suddenly asked me if I had a place to stay, and I said I sure did. Then, then he pulled out some money and tried to give me five dollars!