To Feel Loved

I just spent the afternoon and early evening with one of my favorite women. She's a wiser woman, an older woman than I, mid-fifties. She's always been known to her friends and family as the bubbly one, the party thrower, the squealer....short and petite but a scream of enjoyment that knocks you over. She's wonderful. The woman who's house is home to all her friends and who shoves a plate of food in front of you when you sit down. We have recently been sitting down over decaf coffee, water, juice, or her new favorite...smirnoff ice in Mandarin Orange!

This woman has always given, has always had a smile on her face. Today she said to me "I have never, ever, ever felt loved. By anyone. Ever." Period. She has felt such a burden of secret pain as far back as she can remember, and even to this day. There are so many people that I see in a day that have never felt loved. If so many people feel alone and unloved it would seem we could all just get together and understand and love and be free. But I know that is not how it works. I looked at her and I understand why people are cynical. I never used to understand. I thought it was our job to will positive things into being. I thought if I could truly believe the goodness of people, the reality of love, I would have it in abundance and so would the people around me. Being as young as I am I have had minimal hardships, I have not carried a burden for decades, optimism to the young is easier I suppose, to the untouched. Optimism to the sad and broken must seem silly, a slap in the face even. However, I still believe to an extent as I did before. Not so much that it is my obligation to will good things into being but that it is within my capability to breed them. and it is my responsibility to understand my limitations. I can't change this womans experiences or her perceptions of her hardships. But I can love her myself, and I can prove through my life that you can find real love (I'm not talking strictly man and woman love, but love in general) if you want it. That the good life of love and sacrifice and taking the high road and fellowship is worthwhile. That is within my abilities, I just need to do it.