significant and meaningful

 After the death of one’s mother, the world seems cloaked in death. A blood red cloak of unrelenting night. We want to be seen and loved, but all slips away into the darkness, and all we can do is cling to those who remain, hoping for as much time as possible. Before her death, people came into my life needing light, but I was too deeply buried in my own shelter, afraid of having my individuality taken away. That caused hurt to others. After her death, although I had family and friends around the world to talk to, there was only one person who was physically here. She too had lost her mother as well as her father and her husband. Nine months after my mother’s death, this friend died, too, while I was travelling around Europe, drunk with friends. This often haunts me. She deserved more. 

As a youngster, secure in my family home, I was able to watch and read anything. I loved horror, in fact, and read a lot of difficult novels about hardship that made me grateful for my parents and friends. These days, I have to be cautious. I can’t watch films containing car crashes, violent abuse, neglect of animals and children, and I find it difficult to read about these things, too.  In many cases it is true; the pen is mightier than the sword. Not in a particular moment, not one individual with a pen fighting another with a sword. But, in the end, in the lofty books of history, the poet’s word, penned on paper (or typed on digital screen) will last longer than the petty attempts at revenge deployed by a failure. Words are powerful. Extremely powerful. Books continue to speak to us long after we have closed them. They open our eyes to worlds we do not know, they teach us about the suffering, and the joy, of others. They connect us as a species that has existed for millennia, often sharing the same concerns, the same hopes, the same goals and dreams. They also reveal to us that some were never fortunate enough to dream or hope or experience any of the love and life that us fortunate ones have experienced. 

We can often feel like modern life is transactional. It often is. Some use others for money, power, wealth… some use others for sex, status, fun, fame. When possible, try to listen, try to see, try to show kindness. The most important thing that we can do is show someone a little light and let them know that they are significant and meaningful, too.