Selective Concerns

Latchkey kids don't deal with tornado warnings well.

"What if a tornado comes and destroys our house?  Will mom be mad at me for not saving our home?  Will she blame me?"

Little thoughts.  Big ideas.

Only once have I heard the words, 'tornado warning'.  I was scared as hell.

I don't understand tornadoes; how they indiscriminately kill and destroy.  Skip a house.  Demolish two.  Skip the school.  Tear open a hospital.  Skip the 200 room mansion.  Crush the small mobile home.

I watch the news.  I read the virtual sympathy cards.  I care for a minute.  Then, I move on.

Call it selective concern.

AIDS ribbons don't create compassionate people; knowing someone with AIDS does.

Cancer has been on my mind lately.  The hypochondriac roommate uses that word frequently.  Five family members and a husband later, I suppose I don't blame her obsession with death and cancer.

I care for a minute.  Then, I move on.

My concern gets a little more detailed when she invites her cancer friend over for dinner.  To weak to walk more than 50 steps at a time, his cancer feels contagious.

I care a little more when I start thinking he might cough on me.

I know cancer is not contagious but still...

Mom had cancer when I was a kid.  She never told me at the time.  Years later when some cysts were found in her stomach, she mentioned it to me.  As she was discussing the cancer she had when I was a kid, all I could think was....

THAT'S LOVE.

She didn't want me to lose my sense of security.

Latchkey kids consider themselves a little less loved than those two parent kids who come home to a house of love after school.  I suppose having a parent that has cancer while working day and night might enlighten a child on what love means.

I suppose her reward was my lack of concern.
Because I was not aware that there was something to be concerned of.

Cancer is back in the headlines in my life today.  And it's not my mom.

I care a lot about cancer.

It indiscriminately kills and destroys.  Skip the rapist.  Kills the young promising kid with potential.  Skip the mother.  Takes the father.  Skip the man that has lived a full life.  Crushes the woman who is capable of changing the world.

Cancer is just like a tornado.

I care more about tornadoes than I normally would.