Walking down the street, trying to see through the eyes of the passing people, I was distracted. I didn't have time to warm my waffles. It was a day like that, you know.
I round the corner of Rite Aid, strolling back to my apartment complex (simplex), I spot a woman ambling in my direction. I don't feel special, I know whe isn't walking towards me. She is struggling, though. The closer I get, the more obvious this struggle becomes. She is walking slower than a mile an hour, with a cane in one hand, and another hand searching, searching for something to hold.
I should help her, I think. I should lead her somewhere, or at least offer my help, but here I am, again, stuck in a city of judgemental glances and helpless people. What do I do? What can I do? What could I do?
Nothing. I did nothing.
After I passed her, I held the door for one of my friends. He keeps glancing and can't decide either. On the elevator, we agree that we wanted to help the woman, but,
"But," my friend said in the elevator, "you don't know about her." He laughed, lost somewhere.
I agreed.
1 comment:
What can you do? A torturous question.
There is a significant poplation within our species whose genes do not contain the 'blueprints' necessary to develop the regions of the brain responsible for empathy. That is why some people are too ashamed to live, why some suffer from PTSD, while others (politicians) sleep like babies. A distressing thought, but at least you are not among those who are designed to perpetuate their genes without a care, despite calamity and hopelessness.
We're stuck in a pickle, progressing and digressing between third base and home plate, running away from our doom only to face the same problem from the other angle. That's a bad analogy. We are the problem. We're like fainting goats. Our evolutionary experiment in survival is self-defeating.
Thank you for writing, Leon, A Jerk, because as Mr. Vonnegut said, "Many people need desperately to receive this message: 'I feel and think as much as you do, care about many of the things you care about, although most people do not care about them. You are not alone.'"
Kevin, Son of Daniel
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