Insensitivity

I've been talking with K. recently about sensitivity and pain, with specific reference to Lazarus and Enoch's vision (the heavens wept). Pain isn't going to hurt you, of course, we know this, but she wanted to know why then the Lord would weep. Blowing it off as temporary doesn't seem divine. Well, I said, you're right. Just because someone's pain is transitory doesn't make it any less real. You have to know the person you're dealing with--sometimes, the correct response is to gently laugh and remind the person that it won't hurt them, and in other cases it's not.

I remember last Christmas, E. M. called me up out of the blue and asked me to pick up A. at the airport because she was supposed to, but couldn't because J. was sick and she needed to stay with him. I had mixed feelings about this--I like A., but I was busy trying to forget K., and there was some awkwardness in my relationship with A. too--but no real decision to make. Of course I will help in any way possible; that decision was made long ago. We got kind of stuck in traffic on the way home, and A. found that she didn't have her key to get into the house, although K. (who had come home on an earlier flight) did, and she was supposed to pick K. up on campus but her car keys were locked in the apartment. I winced inside, but said, okay, let's go pick her up. So we did. I pulled my hat down over my eyes and tried to be invisible. K. didn't say one word to me the whole time. When we got back to Brentwood, I went back to my apartment. "I hate you," I said to Dante, who I thought was the one who made me go through that (even though I now suspect that keeping commitments is mostly Vlad's shtick). Then I think I cried tears of frustration, and real tears for missing her.

Then, of course, I forgot that it had ever happened. What, emotions, me?! Naaah.

-Max

--
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)

Be pretty if you are,
Be witty if you can,
But be cheerful if it kills you.