Heroism and Empathy: Not Just for Times of Crisis

“You’re an interesting species.  An interesting mix.  You’re capable of such beautiful dreams, and such horrible nightmares.  You feel so lost, so cut off, so alone, only you’re not.  See, in all our searching, the only thing we’ve found that makes the emptiness bearable, is each other.”

                -“Contact”, 1997

Two years ago, shortly after the bombing of the Boston Marathon, I began writing an essay.  I was inspired by the remarkable stories of heroism coming out of such horror, as they often do, and I found myself wondering what it is that makes us act.  More importantly, why do we only act in times of crisis and hardship?  As often happens, my own life got in the way and the essay never got finished.  But with the damage wrought by Hurricanes Harvey, Irma, and Maria, and with similar stories of heroism coming out, I find myself asking these questions once again.

What Happened to My Creative Endeavors?

The other night, I found myself flipping through some of my old writings.  I had pulled out the manuscript of a musical I started writing back in high school (if you can call two and a half scenes a manuscript) because I wanted to scan it.  I don’t know that I will ever try writing that particular musical again, but as a genealogist, I like to make sure things are archived and preserved.  After re-reading it, I started searching through a notebook full of song lyrics and poems I wrote ages ago for some re-writes I did on the second scene in the musical (I later remembered that I actually wrote them directly into the script).  Going through that notebook made me reflect on things and made me wonder why I stopped writing those things.