To Love and be Loved

For reasons not always clear to me, strangers will sit down and tell me their life story. In detail. Every excruciatingly painful moment. And you can tell it hurts them to speak so and yet they must speak. Perhaps it’s my sparkling wit that attracts them.

Seriously, this happens frequently. In fact, a few days ago I had plunked myself down on a counter seat at a local restaurant. I had been walking around doing errands and I was tired, so I thought I’d sit for awhile and have a cup of coffee. There was a gentleman sitting next to me, balding, short and pudgy and with eyes hidden under a baseball cap. I smiled at him as he turned to me and wished him a good morning. He was very shy about smiling back, cringing almost as a dog would who had been hit before and expected it now. After a moment or so, however, he realized that I wasn’t being sarcastic and actually meant it and gave me a very tentative smile in return.

I gave the waitress my order and turned back to him. I could see that it cost him to get up the courage to ask me how I was doing. I gave him a big smile and said I was doing great! That stumped him for a second and he asked if I really meant that or was I just being polite. No, I replied, I really meant it. I was really doing great. And you, I returned? He thought for a second and replied that he was about middlin’, somewhere between bad and great. That’s better than just bad, I said. He nodded as if that hadn’t occurred to him before.

By then he felt somewhat more comfortable and bravely asked a few more questions of the getting-to-know-you type, such as ‘do you live here,’ ‘where do you work,’ etc. I returned the questions and that was pretty much all it took to open him up.

This gentleman had been married for 25 years and was now divorced with one son grown up. His wife had been diagnosed with multiple personality disorder early in their marriage, a condition that is still pretty rare and not always correctly diagnosed. She had been badly abused as a child and had compensated by escaping in this way. That must have made for an interesting life, I said. Oh, yes, he replied. I never knew who I was going to spend the day with. Now that made me laugh and startled, he returned the laughter. Well, I’ll bet you never got bored, now did you? No, he said, grinning, I never did.

He had been divorced for ten years now and had had several relationships, none of which had lasted. He was on a disability pension which gave him about $600 a month to live on and Food Stamps which brought in another $110. He had genetic conditions that had rendered him unfit for the mechanically related work he used to do. He was also being treated for depression, which didn’t surprise me in the least. I would have been depressed, too. He lived in a small trailer that cost $245 a month for rent, and I could imagine the limited conditions under which he survived.

I needed to get up and stretch my back again so I invited him to go for a walk with me by the beach. That really surprised him – that I would actually want to spend time with such as he was completely unexpected. We paid our bills and walked out and down toward the beach area. It was a cloudy day but pleasant and many folks were out walking their dogs or just sight seeing. I smiled at everyone I greeted, petted dogs and chatted with their owners. He was very surprised at my outgoing behavior and how almost everyone responded warmly. There were a few who didn’t or couldn’t respond but that didn’t bother me. It obviously bothered him, however, because he complained of their behavior and said they were rude and he felt like cussing them out for not being friendly. I replied that they might have been having a bad day or they were feeling shy or just couldn't respond, but it had no effect on me. It was their stuff, not mine. That made him thoughtful again as we walked on, enjoying the breezes off the ocean and the birds running up and down the exposed beach. The tide was almost completely out and large ships could be seen on the horizon.

We walked until he needed to stop and I thanked him for spending some time with me and told him if he was at the restaurant next week we could do this again. His face radiated delight as he agreed and we parted with smiles on our faces.

I do actually know why people tell me their stories. I meet folks every day whose faces light up when I greet them or chat with them and it’s apparent that they have had very little contact with anyone for a while. And what I sense in them is a need to reach out, to be touched in return, to be remembered and to be loved. In short, they are lonely and their loneliness will kill them as surely as a heart attack. Because it is their hearts which are sick and dwindling, atrophied and wearing down because no one cares for them anymore. Children have grown and moved away, spouses and friends have died, or they themselves are sick in a way that means that no one can reach them anymore. We can always try to get through to them but some have already been lost and may not come back this way again.

I know, however, that when I have taken the time to reach out to people, I have always been rewarded far more than they. It has become a delight to me to know that I might have been the best part of their day. What a gift! And though their stories are different in circumstances and surroundings, in another way they are all the same. The stories reveal that these fellow wanderers are humans just like the rest of us and crave love and attention, as do we all. To know that for one moment that I have been able to give someone this short time of attention and love surely makes my day! And I sincerely hope that your day will also be a gift to yourself and to everyone you know.

Fairy Tales Can Be True

I remember reading in mythology as a child that those who were foolish enough to look upon the faces of the gods were either struck blind, mad or dead. I would have preferred blindness if anyone had asked me because that would have been some kind of memory, you know? Dead was just too permanent but madness had its own special allure. Just because you were mad didn’t mean you couldn’t have some fun.

I met a happy mad man not too long ago. I say ‘mad’ but in truth he could have been experiencing any kind of physical or mental disorder. Or maybe he had no disorder at all. Who am I to say that he wasn’t telling the truth? I believe in fairy tales, don’t you?

I met this gentleman while I was walking with a friend to the farmer’s market downtown. She was with her two dogs, a wolf and a golden retriever. Lovely animals! We strolled along chatting about this and that, and this perfectly normal appearing elderly gentleman came towards us. We both smiled and said good morning to him, and he stopped and said, ‘my sister lives up there.’ He was pointing straight up to the sky but I thought he might actually be pointing at some houses on the bluff above. I asked him if he meant the houses and he said no, up there, repeating his finger pointing at the sky. ‘She’s waiting for me, preparing a place for me,’ and I thought, oh, she’s already died and he’s happy knowing that she’ll be there waiting for him. He then explained that his sister was Mary Poppins.

That was great! My friend and I looked at each other with delighted faces and I said, “That’s wonderful! I wish I had a sister who was Mary Poppins. Heck, I wish I were Mary Poppins!”

His face lit up and he gave us a big smile and continued on his stroll. My friend and I didn’t discuss him because both of us were all too familiar with the good folks who weren’t always tracking in this reality. But I continued to think about him long after I finished shopping at the farmer’s market and returned home.

Had this delightful man merely come up with a fantasy that helped him cope with his sister’s death? Had he simply forgotten to take his medications that morning? Or had he dreamt that his sister had come to him in a form he could understand that let him know that he hadn’t been alone, would never be alone? I don’t know, but we all have ways of coping with the world when the reality is just too painful.

I remember when my mother had gone through a treatment of electric shock therapy for her depression and had come home after recovering. I got up with her at 3:00 a.m. and we drank coffee, smoked cigarettes and told tales. She shared with me that when she had been given an electric shock treatment that a friend of hers, a green dragon, would come to take her out of her body so she wouldn’t have to experience the pain that came with it. I asked her where her friend had taken her and she had replied, Mars. I had been delighted with the thought (and still am) because the treatment had looked so brutal and harsh and I had been glad to know that Mom believed she had been protected and with someone during it.

Was it true? Why not? Many people believed in angels and still do – why couldn’t hers have appeared as a green dragon? I had been raised Catholic and angels had been standard fare in this religion. Whatever the source it had helped her through a very difficult experience and I had been very glad she had her dragon angel to help her cope.

I had dealt with a difficult childhood by becoming a perfectionist and had demanded the same from everyone around me. Those who had failed to come up to my standards had heard about it too, believe me. Looking back I know now that I had been trying to exert some kind of control over my own reality to compensate for the horrible lack of control I had felt as a child. That everyone around me suffered also when I had been on a rant is one of my crosses to bear but I try to make up for it today by giving the understanding and patience to others that I never had as a child from my parents.

Mental illness frightens some people. It used to frighten me because there were times I wasn't too sure how I was faring in that area. But unless they are paranoid schizophrenics with violent tendencies, they no longer frighten me. I’m comfortable in my reality now, the fear and despair now replaced by compassion, happiness and love. Delusions don’t make me uncomfortable – indeed, they can be quite helpful if they don’t interfere with daily living. This gentleman had come up with a fantasy that helped him get through the day and I sure wasn’t going to take that away from him. Besides, who wouldn’t want Mary Poppins for a sister? I sure would!

Drunk Don't Make You Worthless

I fell once when I was in the midst of a crowd. My cane went flying and I went down, my knees and elbows bruised and my embarrassment high. I wasn’t down for long, though. It seemed like a thousand hands reached out to help me up, hand me my cane and steady me as I regained my balance. I gratefully thanked everyone I could see who had helped, brushed myself off and continued to stroll.

What would have happened, however, if I fell and no one reached out to help? Instead of giving me a hand, they simply stood around as I groped for my cane and struggled to my feet. I would have been deeply disappointed in my fellow humans for not helping someone who needed it, I know that, but I would have felt terribly hurt and humiliated. Was I not worth a kind act? Was I not a human like you and worthy of a hand that would reach out and help me?

That’s exactly what I witnessed a couple of weeks ago as I sat at our downtown transit station waiting for my bus to go home. I was tired, my back hurt, my feet hurt, even my hair hurt and all I wanted was to lie down and rest. But across the street a bus pulled up, the wheelchair ramp came down and one of my fellow travelers rolled off. I waved to the man in the wheelchair and he waved back. Just then, however, I saw a woman stumble down the ramp and hit her head hard, and I mean hard, on the ground. She lay there motionless as a crowd began to gather. The bus driver stepped off the bus and placed her purse under her head to cushion her and then began calling his transit director. Everyone else simply continued to stand around her and stare. No one checked her breathing, no one asked if she was OK, no one did anything but talk to each other and stare.

I grabbed my backpack and ran across the street, tossing the bag to the side as I knelt to feel for her breathing. I had been a Hospital Corpsman in the Navy and at least knew the basics. She was unconscious but breathing just fine, though as I brushed her hair back from her face I felt one of the biggest knots on her head I’ve ever felt. Wow! I looked up at the bus driver and asked him to call 911 because this lady just might have a concussion. He said he would and the folks around me began telling me that she had been so drunk she fell off her seat on the bus twice during the ride. I looked up as I listened to this and the disgust was clear in everyone’s face. She was also an Indian and how much that factored in to their disgust and lack of desire to help was certainly a question to ponder.

At that moment she stirred and I asked her if she could hear me and she said she could and started crying and trying to move. I smoothed her hair back and spoke to her gently, asking her to lie still until the paramedics came because she had been hurt. She sobbed that the pain was so bad, so bad, and I continued to stroke her hair and cheek and assure her that I was with her and help was on the way. The paramedics arrived just then and two nice young men rushed up, pulling on their gloves as they prepared to touch her and the crowd made sure they knew that she was ‘drunk as a skunk’ (I’ve actually never seen a drunk skunk, but what do I know?), and had stumbled off the bus. Even the paramedics had a whisper of disgust on their face for just a second, and then their professional faces slid on and they began to work with her. I blessed her silently and asked the nearest bus driver who knew me well from our travels together on his route to help me up. He very willingly did and I struggled to my feet, very grateful for his hand.

He reached out to help me, but other than place the purse under her head had stood around the fallen lady like everyone else. Of course, one of the reasons folks just stood around might have been because they didn’t know what to do. But the obvious looks of disgust on their faces told the closer truth of how they felt about the woman laying sprawled at their feet. Another drunken Indian. Who cares? That’s all they do anyway. Good for nothin’ except building casinos.

Well, I have had a little experience with alcoholism. My mother was an alcoholic and I have had difficulties with it myself. I no longer even care to drink but I remember my mother’s and my own despair that lay beneath the desire to blot out everything with anything alcoholic. For both of us it was a need to hide, to escape from the daily pain of living, to forget for awhile the depression that never seemed to lift. It is a physical addiction, yes, but more importantly it is a disease of the spirit. Until I developed a strong connection to my own God I felt helpless to break out of the pattern of negative beliefs. I’m not religious but I’m deeply spiritual and only when I began to see the God within myself and everyone else did I truly begin to heal.

And, God help me, I felt that same disgust for my own mother. I was too young to understand her unhappiness and despair; I only comprehended that her alcohol was more important than me and my siblings and that when she was drunk she was a staggering, rambling, pathetic figure. It would be many years before I reached the point where I understood exactly what she had gone through and my anger left and my compassion grew from then on.

My mother didn’t reach the point, or not that I’m aware of, anyway, of developing some kind of inner connection with a spiritual source. She also was mentally ill and her poorly treated condition played a large part of her attempt to escape into oblivion. She more or less ended up that way, however, since she developed a condition that in laymen’s terms meant her brains were pickled. She spent her last years in a nursing home and experienced petit mal seizures and continued to deteriorate. She finally died in March of last year and I was so happy for her to finally leave her tired, damaged body. God bless her journey!

I’m no saint. Just ask my family and they will assure you that I’m as human and flawed as the next person! (Sorry, but I had to laugh at this point because I know what kind of numb nut I’ve been and my family knows where the bodies are buried - that’s figuratively, of course.) But my own journeys have taken me down paths that have allowed me to see others in a new light, a light of compassion and sympathy, and most importantly, of love. Everyone deserves at least this most basic of assumptions that we are unique and important in the universe, no matter our circumstances. As one homeless and extremely inebriated man angrily told me, 'just because you're drunk don't make you worthless.' I couldn't agree more. I started this blog to share this with others of like mind and for those who have never considered their fellow beings in this light. I hope it brings you to a different view of yourself as someone deserving of love and that others deserve this too.

May God bless your journey!

An Introduction to People of the Bus

I suppose that all good blogs should have a reason for being. Why else put your thoughts out there for the whole world to read? Unless you’re a serial killer, I guess, who just wants to sicken as many folks as possible. As interesting as that idea might be for some people, I confess that it’s not my reason.

What I wanted to do was tell the story of the folk I meet daily who walk the streets and ride the bus because they are a) handicapped, either mentally or physically, b) going green in a big way and eschewing gas guzzlers, c) have had their driver’s license suspended or taken away and are actually adhering to these restrictions, d) are single mothers with babies or people just too poor to afford a car, or e) are kids who are going to school from elementary level on up to college. What makes this population, especially the handicapped folk, so special to me is that I’ve been unable to drive for health reasons for several years and only since 2007 have I recovered to the point where I can walk without a cane. Where it’s too far to walk or I’m just too tired, I take the bus – that is, if I can’t scrounge a ride from someone else. I daily walk the streets with these good folk and see them frequently on the bus and they have become very special to me. They are unique, endearing and brave, and I love them.

While I was forced to ride in an electric cart and use a cane, I noticed a peculiar reaction from folks I met or passed by. Most would try to avoid eye contact with me or ignore me if I said hello. If I was with my then husband, they would talk to him but not to me. I had vanished somehow, my cart or cane rendering me invisible to their eyes. Although I understood they reacted this way from fear – there but for the grace of God go I – it still hurt. It was dehumanizing and I felt isolated and an outcast. I felt ‘less than’ and no longer a member of the population. That I was still the same old Lea inside even with a cane couldn’t reach many of these folk and I felt compassion for them for being so afraid. It inspired me, however, to go out of my way to greet all people, regardless of their condition, and let them know that at least one person believed they were human and deserved to be treated so.

Of course there were the strong folk who understood our humanity and treated us accordingly and to them I am forever grateful and have held them up as examples for my behavior. They are far fewer than I’d like, however, so I have resolved to enlarge their numbers by one.

Because I live in a small town and some of these bus riders are well known wanderers, I’ve changed their names and altered their physical traits enough so their privacy is protected. I have no intentions of ridiculing or poking fun at these fellow travelers, though sometimes they are funny and unintentionally so. I will simply try to portray them as the human beings they are, with the same needs for affection and acceptance as the rest of us. Some are severely handicapped and it is difficult sometimes to recognize that there is a person beneath the outer trappings longing to be loved and lonely for attention. It is for these folk, the forgotten, the unloved, the human outcasts that this blog is for. Perhaps if I can portray their humanity well enough others won’t be afraid to reach out and greet them, even become friends with them. Such a relationship brings riches far more to the one who reaches out than the one who receives, but both are better for the trying. It’s a thought, at least!