“My life cannot implement in action the demands of all the people to whom my heart responds.” Anne Morrow Lindbergh
Truer words were never spoken for me. I am in a city with a huge homeless population. I am a thinking and caring person and I react to everything that I see of human suffering. But I rarely know what to do. Tonight, I watched a Frontline on PBS about Darfur. My achievement for the day was that I didn't cry hysterically. Honest. As in this case, when I see something like this, I want to do something, anything, to contribute. Most of the time, I literally cannot do anything. After all, I am a part of the vacationless class: housewives and mothers. I am already busy. I am already overwhelmed with teaching my child the gospel, love of learning, to be healthy, to brush his teeth, how to put on flip-flops, not to poke his eye out, music, reading, how to make a bed, not to jump over his sisters, etc. etc. etc. I am awash in a sea of spit-up and diapers, surrounded by neediness of the most acute kind: baby survival.
About 2 weeks ago now, maybe 3 weeks, my doorbell rang at 8 o'clock. I answered the door to find a randomly dressed, and slightly manic looking woman with long hair standing far back on my front porch. She held out her hand and asked me if I could spare a quarter so that she could go get a "delicious cheesyburger." I responded that I was sure I could, told her "just a minute," closed and locked my door (after all, I have babies in the house) and I found some change in my wallet-- about $1.50--not much, but something immediately available. I opened the door and gave her the money and she was off with a thank you very much.
Now, besides resisting the urge to laugh hysterically everytime I think of the way she said "cheesyburger" One, because it was a funny word, and two because it's one of those situations that laughter is sooo inappropriate that it automatically comes out, this situation has really stuck with me. I mean, people are now coming directly to my front door to ask for help?? It is truly humbling. In Las Vegas, during the spring and summer, we have a lot of people pan-handling on the street corners. And, if you are unlucky enough to be stuck at a traffic light next to someone with a sign-- what do you do?
I usually look around uncomfortably when I don't have change, like everyone else does. Most of the time, I don't carry cash. I carry a debit card. But, I do carry extra water and snacks for Matthew and myself. So, my solution has been for the last year or so, to give people water and food that I happened to have around. I have had people take a bag of trail mix and say "Thank you." and I have randomly had money and given that as well. This summer, I decided that I will make sure to have extra water and food as much as I can. I've also thought that if i have a baggie with a few wipes, granola bar, water, change for a phone call that I could probably do that as well.
Does anybody else get as upset about this as I do? The world is soooo overwhelming sometimes. You want to help people, you want to reach out and serve people, but within the confines of your situation it is impossible to do. Lets face it, most of us can't even make it for a one on one visiting teaching visit, let alone to go out and make the world a better place for perfect strangers. I was ungrateful because my morbidly expensive house keeps falling apart around me and losing property value: yet, I have a house. In fact, I have a heck of a lot more than a house. The fact that I can read and have a college education puts me-- and you for that matter-- ahead of at least 90% of the world. I just think of King Benjamin and realize that until we are literally grateful just to have each breath, we don't really get to the level of gratitude required to understand just how much we are in debt ourselves.
So, I'm just sending this out to the universe. If I could, I would change the world today. I would change political structures, I would change language barriers, I would evict all the horrible African warlords from the earth, and change every life that I could. As it is, today and tomorrow, I will just change diapers.
5 comments:
Wow.
When I was leaving for my mission, someone very cynically said to me, "You can't change the world." I thought about it for a minute and told them, "No. But I can change SOMEONE'S world." Melissa, you do what you can which is more than most people. Thank you for this post.
Yes. I struggle with this. There are times when I struggle with it more than others. I usually have a period of time where I'm trying to do all I can to help others less fortunate and then it's like I have to shut it out for a while. Back and forth I go. I don't know if that's normal or not. Slow and steady wins the race, they say. This was a really great post.
Cindi
Thanks for your thoughts. I think sometimes it is so overwhelming that I tend to do nothing and make myself believe that raising good kids is enough. Reading this makes me realize that I can do so much more. I just need to think outside of the box. Thanks bunches. Love you!!!
we used to make a sack lunch and bring it in the car and give it to this guy we always saw off a freeway exit. makes me feel warm and fuzzy.
and yes, we are related- it makes me upset, too
It makes me upset that you could make me upset. Really Melissa - do i really need more tears in my life? lol! Teasing. That was a super wonderful post. You are great. And I love you.
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