Someone (who shall remain nameless) once told me that I didn’t love people because I’m a “tree hugger,” as if I couldn't love both. There’s no doubt that I love nature and animals, and it’s true that sometimes I like them better than people. I'm not as bad as Amy Sedaris (whose brother David Sedaris on "This American Life" tells the story ....) who when having seen a traffic accident with injuries said, "Oh God, I hope there wasn't a dog in that car!" Actually I'm probably a lot like Amy Sedaris, but let’s face it, when you look at what people do to each other in this world it just makes you want to…. want to… go hug a tree! But I would have to argue with this someone, that despite man’s inhumanity to man, I really like almost everyone and love humanity in general. Do I think the earth would be a better place without humans? Truthfully, yes. But, one on one, most people are great.
Who wouldn't want to wrap their arms around one of those?This leads to the subject of donating blood - a loving act towards humans, not trees (interesting segue.) I have tried for YEARS to encourage my coworkers to donate blood at our local Red Cross Chapter House across the street from my office. July in particular is a low donation month because so many people are on vacation and not in their normal routine. In getting coworkers to give to their fellow man I have been partially successful. Several have gone and said they’d never do it again. Some have gone more than once. Some have gone and the Red Cross has asked them never to return (it's true!)
Well, yesterday I was successful in getting two new people to go. I’m not sure they’ll go again, but they did in fact successfully donate a pint a piece! Who says I don’t love people?
The chapter house across the street from work.
Bob, the volunteer, who is so funny it's worth going just to see him.He can barely walk, but he's always there when I go.
My two victims, straight from the office. Stephanie (L) forcing a grin through the sense of impending doom, and Angel (R) trying to look like she's OK about the whole thing.
The pre-panic attack grimace.
4 comments:
As someone who knows you, I would assert that you do not hate people, to be sure, but not because you see any positive attributes in them but because you just do not hate. I think you give of yourself to people, as in your case with blood giving, because of an interesting combination of two fators, neither of which is necessarily related to your liking people, one related to your congenital sense of aesthetics and symmetry, and another, related to your yearning to create and contribute to the inherent beauty and harmony that one can find in acosystems in all of nature. Helping to improve conditions of the humans necessarily would help put them in your eyes in a more harmonious state of existence and not because you inherently love people, as is the case for you with all other non-human beings: a human in distress is a piece of nature out of wack, asymmetrical, and humans, as dislikable as you might find them, they are living beings and it is the "life-essence" within these ugly things called humans that touches your heart, making them in your eyes an unfortunate part, a part nonetheless, of your beloved nature.
I don't know about all that, Daddy, but I do know that Mommy is one of the nicest human beings I've ever met...not just to me, to everybody. Whether she loves them or not, her actions speak much to her credit of not being a misanthropist.
-Shirin
By the way, I love to give blood and I'm definitely more misanthropic than Mommy is. I just think it's kind of fun and makes me feel like I'm helping people, despite my general dislike for humankind as a whole.
-Shirin
Shirin's comments are more accurate than Saeed's :-)
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