She floated precariously close to the edge of the cliff. Her toes curled over the rim as if they were holding the ridge aloft like a craggy black curtain. I approached her cautiously, fearing that my presence might startle her and tip her into the chasm. She stared straight ahead, her eyes a mixture of wonder, confusion and something I could only describe as longing.
She seemed to sense my presence as I tiptoed closer and a sad smile curled the side of her lips.
“Are you okay?” I asked rather lamely because I did not know what I would do if she decided to uncurl her toes and step forward.
I thought of the movies and TV shows that I had seen where the hero or heroine made a courageous leap that rescued the damsel in distress from a hideous fall. I recalled also that sometimes a desperate lunge morphed into an unplanned push that wrenched gasps and screams of despair and horror from the audience.
I waited.
She tilted her head slightly over her right shoulder and I saw how serene she appeared. Disturbingly, she looked familiar and with a jolt I felt we knew each other.
“Do I know you?” I asked. “what is your name?”
“I am Love,” she breathed.
Instantly, I recalled Love. It had been a long time since I had been in love’s presence, but the comfort, security and strength that she radiated wrapped around me like a warm blanket.
“Where have you been,” I blurted as if in accusation.
“I have been in a battle,” she sighed.
I stepped closer and could now feel her weariness, see the pallor of sorrow on her cheeks and the glint of betrayal hiding in the depths of emerald eyes.
She continued, “Anger, meanness, apathy, selfishness and lies have avowed war. They have mocked me with their callousness and trampled my soul.
They have unashamedly masqueraded as truth, compassion, empathy and even morality. And though I thought no one could be deceived by this treachery, they have insinuated a culture of blame into our world.”
For what seemed like forever I let her words tumble around in my head, jolting and careening into each other as I tried to steer them into the tidy niches that categorized my world. They no longer fit. I could not match the things going on in the world today with my version of Love.
I slumped to the ground as I accepted the reality that we had indeed lost our souls. We had abandoned our brothers and sisters to the self-serving whims of politics, commercialism, racism, pleasure and greed. We smothered our guilt with ludicrous, even laughable justifications as we avoided anyone or any place that threatened to call our bluff or expose our iniquities.
“You mean that we got so busy chasing the American dream that we neglected the things that are most important,” I concluded.
She nodded, “We bought the lie that we were exempt from hardships.”
“When did this happen?” I spoke into the breeze as if it could billow into a wind and poll the universe.
“It began slowly but seems to have accelerated over the last few decades,” Love answered.
“How? Complacency?” I seemed unable to mumble more than disjointed words.
“We suffered from an overwhelming numbness as events too terrible to comprehend occurred again and again like last season’s reruns.
We seemed to get used to school shootings, crimes and murder in our neighborhood, slaughter of innocent children, drug use, suicides, demeaning treatment of blacks and women -just to name a few. The media exposed and sensationalized even the smallest incident in excessive detail if they thought it would increase their ratings. We were no longer shocked at what we saw on TV.”
“What were we to do?” I whined. “stepping up or trying to intervene could put you or your family in jeopardy”
“Often, yes. Closing your ears, eyes and your mouth has become a means of survival. But it has also closed us off. Indeed, the rhetoric and words from many who claim to be leaders and heads of state are more dangerous than the actions of terrorists.
We’re too busy to care or speak up for our values because it takes too much energy and it’s too risky. It is easier to blame others or complain.
We protest that public education is broken, but do nothing about it. We deny that our family and our homes are also broken because then we would have to fix them. In general, we avoid responsibility and spend a great deal of time looking for a convenient scapegoat.
We don’t talk, laugh, play or share our lives in ways we once knew. How can we care about or love others if we refuse to get to know or attempt to understand their pain?” she finished.
I felt an urgent question welling up in my heart but I could not yet put it into words.
“Is there something else wrong?” I ventured.
“We have lost something very dear to us,” she said regretfully “and we must find it before we are lost forever.
Several ideas filtered through my thoughts before I asked, “What have we lost?”
“God,” she answered, “We abandoned God like an aging Uncle we dropped off at a nursing home, but never intended to visit unless compelled to do so. We banished God from our schools, our institutions, our homes and perhaps even from our churches.”
I nodded sagely, evoking the Supreme Court decisions in 1962 and 1963.
Love continued, “God has become an old-fashioned notion. We replaced Him with technology, glitzy gadgets with lots of buttons that do remarkable things and are themselves replaced by shinier gadgets almost overnight. All done without any consideration for the consequences. We fell in love with man’s ingenuity, ignored God’s teaching and are morally much worse off.”
The wind was picking up and I slipped my arms into my jacket and buttoned it closed. I glanced at Love. Like the mountain she did not yield to the wind no matter how strongly it blew. I was suddenly lonely and longed to bring back Love’s smile.
Instead I felt the weight of her sorrow. Her shoulders slumped under the burden of aggression, violence, hatred and indifference. What was happening to us? We seemed in danger of losing our identity, ignoring our history, lowering our expectations. We worshipped affluence, evolving into a population of entitled entertainment junkies.
Unexpectedly, I felt uncertainty split my thoughts and send them flying. Was I feeling fear or was I afraid of feeling? My greatest fear was that I would feel something terrible, yet I realized fear had no power to demolish bad feelings, only prolong them. Why then did I let it hold me hostage? My confusion began to dissipate.
We are not truly alive without feelings.
Of course I knew Love.
I remembered feeling Love as I held a baby in my arms, with the hug of a little boy, through the secrets shared with siblings and the kiss of a lover. I recalled how love injected joy and happiness into my days and comforted me on cold and scary nights. Love showed up when I encountered a soul mate on an adventure or when I was lost and alone and unsure of my next step. I fell in love with music and dancing and the amazing beauty of art and sculptures. Love touched me through the majesty of the land with its trees, flowers, birds and wild life. I felt Love when a lonely dog licked my hand or a cat crawled into my lap.
I laughed out loud. I loved chocolate and snowballs, apple pies and ice cream. Love was as abundant as the stars in heaven.
I rushed to the brink of the cliff and gathered Love in my arms, pulling her on to the green grass.
“Let’s do something,” I begged, “before it is too late.”
“What do you suggest,” Love asked.
“Something radical,” I insisted.
“I know,” she said, her cheeks flushing a warm rose color and her eyes sparking to life, “let’s be fearlessly optimistic.”
I was overwhelmed by the simplicity of the solution. Optimism moves forward and accelerates progress while pessimism keeps life at a standstill. It is hard to be cruel and cynical in the face of Love’s courage. Love is enduring and fills the soul with joy, confidence and good will until they overflow and touch the soul of a neighbor or a stranger.
Still I was wary, “Will it work?”
Love stooped down and picked up a handful of small stones chipped from the mountain and placed them in her pocket. I cocked my head quizzically.
“We begin to move this mountain by carrying away the smallest stones,” she said, “and if we drop a stone we get up and do it again.”
I felt the truth in her response. At one time or other we are all broken by the world but afterward as observed by Ernest Hemingway, some are strong at the broken places. It would happen that way.
Love is never wrong.
Pessimism kills the instinct that urges
men to struggle against poverty, ignorance and crime, and dries up all the
fountains of joy in the world.
– Helen Keller