That Man

I was reading "The Inner Voice of Love" by Henri Nouwen last night, before I went out dancing with some friends, and for whatever reason when we got there I kept thinking about the lines " ... your pain was the form in which you came in touch with the human condition of suffering. Your pain is the concrete way in which you participate in the pain of humanity."

I kept wondering why pain binds us so tightly to each other, often more tightly than any other experience, wondering if it is because we need each other so much in those moments that we drop all pretensions of self-sufficiency and stand there, so vulnerable in our need for kindness. I looked at the people dancing around me, thinking about my pain binding me to them in a common human experience, wondering what each of their individual story of pain was, or will be, wondering about my responsibility to them.

In the embarrassing truthfulness of myself, I must admit that it has been an overwhelming temptation at times to see my experience as unique. No one (at least very few) has been so betrayed, so wounded, so wronged as I have been. I have allowed the uniqueness of myself - the uniqueness that exists because of my individuality - to separate me from "participating in the pain of humanity". I have been very selfish. But the voice that urges me to kindness towards others, also urges me to kindness towards myself and I understand that I have to move through these things, as much as I would like to go above them, to come to this understanding at all.

As I was leaving the club, a man tripped me. His friend had asked me to dance and I had declined for various reasons, not the least being that men I don't know still terrify me and I never dance with them when I go out. I wanted so much to go up to him and justify myself and put him in his place and make him ashamed of the conclusions he had drawn about me. I felt a little bit astonished at his unkindness and of course, had no words at all. I just looked at him, looked at his foot unashamedly stuck out, and walked out the door.
I keep thinking about how my pain binds me to that man and insists that I hold him close.