A big dog, a grocery store line and a gay basketball player help to teach us about humanity

Stone Soup: Vulnerability

The door to the dementia unit is blocked by a very large, imposing Labrador. She is black with a soft gray muzzle and is protecting that door like a sentry. She sits firm and looks at me as if asking for the necessary password. I kneel down on the floor and speak to her softly. To my surprise she immediately rolls over, exposing her belly for me to rub. She closes her eyes and is relaxed, so exposed, so clearly trusting.

After this initial meet I stand up and go about finding my client. He is old, hunched over, a wizened elderly man, sitting in his wheelchair alone in his room. His wife died three months earlier and I wait for him to bring it up-he doesn’t. “Perhaps it’s the dementia” I think to myself.

We talk about his care and his health and finally I ask “Are you hurting anywhere?” He lays his hand over his heart and says softly, “Only here, Judy died three months ago.” I nod and tell him how sorry I am that his wife of 40 years has died. He tears up for a moment and nods. No long conversation, but I asked and he opened up. We sit for a few moments, letting the sadness hang in the air with the reverence of incense at vespers. Vulnerability acknowledged.

On to the store to buy a few things. I am standing in line and the woman ahead of me is fumbling through her purse, obviously not finding whatever it is she needs. The lady behind me sighs, the cashier looks at his watch and then at us conspiratorially as if to say “Whaddya gonna do?”

She is getting clearly very worked up now, taking things out of her purse and setting them up on the counter. She stops and mutters “Oh my God, I don’t have my wallet.” She is embarrassed and holding up the line. She is teary eyed and clearly this is bigger than the few items she has on the counter. I tell her that I will pay for her items and that she can pay it forward with someone else. The cost is minimal. She looks at me wide eyed and says “No! I can’t let you.” With that she starts crying. “My mom died a week ago and I’m trying to take care of my dad, but he’s sick and my mom always took care of him. I’m taking time off from my job and I just don’t know how to do all of this!” I tell her that I have lost my mother too and acknowledge how hard it is to navigate this seminal loss.

Frantic she fishes out a piece of paper, insisting that she will write me a check when she gets home. I lay my hand on her arm and tell her no, she can allow this kindness today and pass it along some other time, really. Her vulnerability is so acute, so raw, that she is almost hysterical. I pay the cashier, give her a little hug and leave. The woman behind me nods, and continues to soothe the woman as I go.

I have been on the receiving end of this stick on many occasions. Once when I was a single parent, raising three children and very poor, my brother-in-law came to the door with a bag of produce. “It’s buy one get one free, and we can’t possibly eat all of this!” he said holding up a bag bulging with apples, oranges and other goodies. I knew that there hadn’t been a sale. I knew he was being kind and trying to help me in such a way to preserve my pride, and that kindness instilled in me a desire to be a better person, to extend myself to others.

So many people talk about raising ourselves up by our boot straps and not depending on anyone else and it really seems to me that many of those same people have forgotten some basics of the golden rule. Even Jesus said “Whatsoever you do to the least of my brethren, that you do unto me.”

A sports figure comes out as a gay man. Some say “So what, why should we care?” I care because somewhere in a bedroom out there is a young fifteen-year-old boy, who was thinking that he should just end his life because of the hatred he feels for being different, for being gay. The vulnerability displayed by a nationally known athlete allows others to venture out and be vulnerable, to believe that different is okay. Celebrated even. And I hope there are those of us who will run ahead, lighting a little path ahead to make it easier for them not to stumble.is, too, is wonderful.

Every day we see people in our lives who are vulnerable and we have the choice about how to respond. I’m not talking about the guy on the corner with a cardboard sign. I’m talking about the woman who had a miscarriage who has her first day back at work and she wonders if anyone will ask how she’s doing, really. The man whose wife has cancer who is buying flowers for her because he can’t think of how to take away her pain. I’m talking about the young woman at the pharmacy with a feverish toddler on her hip, dark circles under her eyes, trying to take in all the instructions about the medication she will be giving when all she really wants is to be free of worry and get a good night’s sleep.

We are broken at different times in our life, and we heal. We have scars that show, and some that don’t. In all the many ways we have been broken there is a story of vulnerability and recovery. And we rarely heal without some help from others, who have stumbled along the way as well.

Today and every day I wish to see the vulnerability that others are showing me. I want to acknowledge it, honor it, celebrate the exquisite fragility of life, and our connectedness to each other.

And I want to try to allow myself to be vulnerable as well, to lay my hand over my heart and admit when there is pain. After all, how do we get those belly rubs without it?

by Therese Dawe