Friday, August 17, 2007

PEOPLE, WE'VE GOT TO LOOK OUT FOR EACH OTHER.

I am so tired of people walking around life clueless and without the attitude of looking out for fellow man. This is UTTERLY disgraceful!
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5 comments:

Deathlok said...

People probably thought that he was waiting for his lost luggage to be found.

8/18/07, 8:26 PM
Sezme said...

You would think the skycap (?) that had the shift for that area would have seen him sitting there FOREVER and would have seen if he needed any help. How could someone not notice him? To that end? Isn't someone watching security cameras? Isn't someone sitting in a spot for a really long time something that should be checked? Ugh.

8/18/07, 8:59 PM
LBJ said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
8/18/07, 11:59 PM
LBJ said...

When we our betters see bearing our woes,
We scarcely think our miseries our foes.
Who alone suffers, suffers most in the mind,
Leaving free things and happy shows behind.
But then the mind much sufferance doth o’erskip
When grief hath mates, and bearing fellowship.”
-William Shakespeare.

When I'm at the airport, heading out to work I'm constantly watching what goes around me. Yet there are moments in my day when I'm privileged to observe simple every-day human interaction without the risk of personal involvement, events which to most people would appear inconsequential but to a lone observer are infused with a sense of poignancy so touching and intense that it leaves one almost breathless.

An event I witnessed this week could have been discarded as trivial or to someone focused on the rush to catch a flight, to get home to a loved one, would have been missed altogether. .

It was a portion of D concorse that is usually quiet which is why I'll sit there to make a phone call or check my flight schedule.

Coming off a plane, a young woman sat down in one of the many empty plastic chairs. I noticed her because she had the same coloring as my daughter, strawberry blond hair and blue eyes. Dressed in low slung jeans and a sweatshirt, she looked like she was 18, though her face showed she was older, and like the rest of us, she looked thrilled to finally be off the small aircraft.

I really should have minded my own business, but I watched her, one leg drawn up, holding her arm up to her chest, as she excitedly got out her cell phone, with a smile and a longing in her movements that touched my heart. Probably going to call the boyfriend or husband to tell him she was on the ground and ready to be picked up. I moved down a couple of chairs to give her a bit of privacy for her conversation, so although I could not hear the words spoken I could not help but notice her reaction as the conversation became animated, then pleading. . . then a dial tone, as tears rained down her face. I've been the recepient of that hurt too many times not to recognize a woman whose heart has just been broken.

I had this sudden almost uncontrollable urge to get up, go to her and tell her it'd be OK, at least offer her a tissue and a comforting smile. But I didn't move. This was none of my business after all, I tried to convince myself.

She sat there crying for a while with a melancholy aura radiating from a face that had just aged 10 years. Then suddenly she got up with her carry-on and disappeared. I had this uneasy feeling of somehow failing to communicate with her, although it was not my affair, never the less - that life was still good, and that the next day would dawn and somewhere down the road there would be someone out there that would not make her cry. But she was gone, disappearing into the grey, humid dullness of a late evening rainshower.

The event I had just witnessed was not earth shattering. On a global scale, compared to the miseries and devastation of Bosnia, Afghanistan, Iraq, the carnage and desolation caused by a hurricane or an earthquake, this little melodrama was less than a quick blip on a radar. On a Universal scheme of things it never happened. Why should it bother me.

But it did, for I had witnessed a fellow traveler in this life's journey in torment and in spite of my good intentions I did nothing to offer help, solace, comfort or just a friendly word or the offer of assistance. It was none of my business... but somehow, as a fellow human being, I know it was... and I failed...

I believe that the distress of even one soul is the pain of all humans. Whether you feel it touches you, or it passes you seemingly unnoticed, no one is entirely free from the heartache of another.

It never stopped raining that night. Perhaps - after all - the heavens have the capacity to cry for even one small person who hurts.

8/19/07, 12:15 AM
Sezme said...

I've been that girl more times than I'd like to admit.

I think our compassion for others, that is born out of being the one deeply hurt, is what makes us want to stop the hurt in others.

I also think that is why I cannot comprehend that someone working where that man was sitting, for hours upon hours, never noticed that the poor man had not moved.

As my dad says, "No sense, no feeling."

8/19/07, 12:26 AM

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