The Crying Game

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My daughter and I are criers. We cry at sad movies, we cry when we are stressed, and we cry when we are so angry that we need an outlet. And sometimes we find something so ridiculous and funny that we laugh until we cry.

I have cried at the funerals of friends and relatives, for the young whose lives have ended too soon, and over the graves of our animal companions buried in our woodland garden. I cry in rage and anger about the ignorance of people who kill each other for a piece of land, in the name of their religion, or because of greed. I cry about the needless deaths of unwanted animals, about the destruction of habitat, and because we are destroying this planet that is our home.

As I grow older, the world and the people in it seem to be getting worse. We have become self-centered, self-absorbed, and value our personal wealth and happiness over the welfare of others. Power, money and profit have become our gods. Everything and everyone is disposable. People think about themselves first and everything else is secondary.

I have always been a "glass half empty" type of person. One of my former employers called me a cynic. I think of myself as a realist. When I became “involved” in animal rescue I cried every day for the animals that were dumped like trash in shelters, for the ones that were abused, neglected, and abandoned, and for the ones we could not save. Sometimes my sadness and helplessness were so overwhelming that crying was the only way to cope. After four years I still cry, but I try to focus on the ones we have saved and channel my energy and anger into something positive.

So this is what I have learned. Crying helps when problems overwhelm us, but the release is only temporary. I always wondered how people who have suffered great losses can survive. I believe their "secret" is to make something positive come out of the negative, to find a purpose, to do some good, to create a legacy.

"Mourn not the dead, that in the cool earth lie, dust unto dust; The calm, sweet earth, that mothers all who die, as all men must; But rather mourn the apathetic throng, the cowed and the meek, who see the world's great anguish and its wrong, and dare not speak!" ~Ralph Chaplin
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