So I’m standing in line for 10 minutes or so at Walmart, waiting to pay for some jeans, and a guy comes comes up behind me. He looks at the till next to us which just recently hung its ‘closed‘ sign up, and we both shrug. “Six of one, six more of the other one,” I offer. “Yup,” He says. “It’s like a zoo in here,” I say. “Yah, not as bad as other places,” he says. We both stand there and nod.
I comment on this because it just seems as though people in every society around the world are starved for friendship, idle chit-chat, hang-out time. There’s this old guy behind me, looking like he’d just coming off a day’s work, so, for no other reason aside from to tell him that the world wishes to say ‘hello’, I opened my yap.
The guy at the till, a younger black guy, looked tired, sick, out of sorts, and out of place. I said, “Hiya, friend. How you doing”? He looked at me with a pensive face as if to say, “Well let me tell you about my day.” He said, “Not too good.” <sigh> I wish I could help out, friend. Age, colour, stature, level of wealth … we’re all brothers and sisters, and we all need love.