Photo by Inzmam Khan: https://www.pexels.com/photo/man-in-black-shirt-and-gray-denim-pants-sitting-on-gray-padded-bench-1134204/
Last week I had a disquieting thought. It was late at night and I was feeling quite dizzy and even a bit faint. My blood oxygen level was really quite low, and I was a tad bit concerned. It dawned on me (not for the first time, but each time it crosses my mind it’s as though it’s a brand-new thought) that should I pass out, trip, or experience any of my other annual summertime rituals that there’d be no one to notice for many hours – maybe even days. Elizabeth is across the country and though I send her frequent tweets (I’ll never call it anything else, sorry) and text her frequently, we only actually talk once or so a week. My neighbors would have no clue if something happened to me. My extended family and I text on birthdays, and I often don’t hear from my dad for a couple to three weeks. My employers would worry, but they wouldn’t know what to do about my seeming to go AWOL. It was almost suffocatingly frightening and lonely.
What I did was I made a plan. I have my Alexas all around my house with a subscription allowing me to call for help if necessary. I am giving my employers access to my house should I not show up to work or to answer texts. Weekends are the scariest because nobody knows whether I go to church or not, whether I’m okay in my house from Friday midday until Monday midday. My daughter and I devised a system where I would send her some kind of proof of life on weekend mornings. I feel much better.
I bring this up because of a story I read on Friday from Tempe, Arizona. Apparently a week ago, on a Friday, a woman clocked in at work in the business offices of a major bank. She never clocked out, and nobody noticed. On Monday people complained of “plumbing problems” causing a smell. They found this woman on Tuesday, at her cubicle, where she had died on Friday. There wasn’t a missing persons report filed and nobody noticed that she was gone.
I’ve been moved by this story. There are so many lonely people surrounding us. Henry David Thoreau wrote, “The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation.” This was in the mid-19th century – before the advent of social media, detached families, and the struggles of modern living. Mind you, I’m not so foolish as to romanticize the 1800’s and believe they were a walk in the park or free from strife. On the contrary, it was a time of hard scrabble living, back breaking labor, and even a war pitting brother against brother. Most people, however, did tend to stay close to their families and communities were smaller and closer-knit.
Today I look around and I see quiet desperation all around. It is heartbreaking! What are we each doing to lessen the despair and pain around us? I know I tend to harp on this a lot, but seriously, what are we doing?
I see a lot of bullying online. People engaging in it don’t call it bullying, they rather call it “telling the truth,” “spreading God’s word,” or “protecting” themselves. These actions increase the burdens carried by others, not lessen them. I know, duh. Right? But there seems to be a subset of online users who either don’t understand or don’t care about the harm they are causing. Not only are they causing harm to the target, but also to everyone who reads such vitriol.
When I was growing up my mother was justifiably worried about my posture. She regularly told me to stand up straight. My sister has some of the absolute best posture in the world. In other words, we are influenced by words intended for someone else and often internalize them as things we ourselves need to change. I know people who eschew public speaking because of comments they’ve heard people say about other speakers. Seriously, being careful in how we speak about and to people should be something we all strive for. I know that I need to be better.
Beyond that, how can we help our fellow travelers in life mired in their personal sloughs of despond or moments of quiet desperation?
I’ve said it before, so please forgive me for beating the proverbial dead horse, but being aware of those around us, learning about them, reaching out to them, letting them know that we care about their lives – those are all ways we can help. Sitting by a widow at church, opening the door for an individual with a baby stroller, not glaring at the parent of the screaming baby on the airplane, inviting an isolated individual over for ice cream, asking the store clerk how they are doing, waving instead of honking at the driver slow to fully back out in the parking lot, and more are ways we can help. There are a myriad of ways to lessen the loneliness – the desperation – of those around us.
We are all traveling this world together. Think about it: we are all isolated together on this small planet in the midst of a vast universe. We should all be helping each other during their sojourn here. Nobody should ever be so alone that no one notices they are gone – absolutely positively nobody. I know that this story from Tempe has strengthened my resolve to be more aware of those around me. As Emily Dickensen said, “If I can stop one heart from breaking, I shall not live in vain. If I can ease one life the aching, or cool one pain, or help one fainting robin unto his nest again, I shall not live in vain.”
Look to God and Live... Joyfully! 