Published: September 14, 2009 10:57 pm      

WHITE-WALKER: Parting a path wider than the Red Sea

Why must the whole world suffer because of those jerks who were maybe dealt a crummy cut in life and they take it out on everybody else? Isn’t there some remote island we can dump them on so that they‘re mission to make others miserable isn’t realized? Of course we want to feel compassion for those whose invisible tears are drowning us all and causing us to not be as kind as we might be, in fact, we could be just like them if we don’t watch it, because ugly moods are dreadfully contagious---more so than happy ones. You see those terrible types heading your way, and they part a path wider than the Red Sea because nobody wants to be near them. You feel like the biggest hypocrite when you force yourself to smile and say hello, when really you want to say, “Go to you- know- where.” Hell, they make everybody’s life hell.

“Do you ever meet people that make you wish their parents, years ago, had gone to the show that night instead of getting ‘ideas’ and acting upon them,” I confided to my dear friend, Mary Lew.

“Yeah, you,” she laughed, and I’m really surprised to hear you talk like that because you like everybody.”

Mary Lew is like that, a real ‘card’ and always validating a person’s emotions and feelings and making them feel good about themselves, so unlike bitter and mean folks that I’m wasting my time writing about. Don’t you wish you could muster up the guts to say to them, “You’re so bitter and mean and that despicable disposition of yours should be declared a national disaster if it spreads any farther?”

Well, that sounds a little mean, so we must try and take the high road.

Sure some people have it much harder that others, and they cry, “Why me, why me?” But I know a slew of people who are plagued with unspeakable heartaches and they manage to lift other people’s spirits up! Like Laura, she has buried two of her children and at 85 is caring for her ailing husband AND handicapped brother. She’s not too well herself with her eyesight failing and her arthritis flaring. When I recently ran into her at the store, I asked the one question I tremble to ask older people, “How are you?” Naturally I care, but I usually get a litany of recent illnesses and operations that date back to when they hit menopause---35 years ago! I’ve actually had my ice cream melt and drip all over my support hose and orthopedic shoes listening to their woes.

This delightful lady simply responded, “I can’t complain, Karen, can’t complain.”

“Can’t complain?” I wanted to cry, “Why you look like a valid argument for funeral homes to accept walk-ins.” But instead I said, “Tell me, dear, what keeps you going? How do you remain so cheerful?”

‘I concentrate on my many blessings, and then I try to forget all about myself and help others.”

Boy, if that doesn’t make most of us feel like self-serving creeps, I don’t know what does. There are people out there who totally eclipse the sun’s warmth, and those who make you feel the sunshine on all sides of you. Global warming, I sure wish it meant a condition caused by too much love and laughter in this world, but then, there would be some people out there who would still complain, never realizing that they need love and laughter the most.

Karen White-Walker is a Wilson resident. Her column runs every Tuesday.