Now, first and foremost, how do you know a person cares for you? Well there are many ways of knowing. There are many interesting ways of being able to tell. If you have to leave the person and get somewhere by driving right before you leave they will tell you to call or text when you make it home so they know you are safe. People don’t just do that to everyone. They say that to the ones that they care about.
Next. They tell you things to not do. For example, they will tell you firsthand to never walk outside at night especially downtown. Even if you can take care of yourself they don’t want to risk it and they don’t want to think anything could happen to you.
If a guy, or someone of the opposite sex, looks at you they will notice and they will step up to let it be known that it’s just not cool.
Lectures will take place. They will tell you how you shouldn’t party with examples of people. They will give you tips on how to deal with things with examples. They will stay up and listen to what you have to say. They will cancel their plans to hang out with you and talk.
They like to know what is going on in your life. They ask questions and they don’t let things just slip on by. They genuinely want to know.
They hold you to another standard than everyone else. You are perfect to them and they expect no less. To them you can’t party, you can’t drink, you can’t swear, and the thought of you having trauma happens frustrates them.
They know when something is up when you’re silent.
You can sit in a room and be quiet and they’ll turn to look at you just to see what you are doing.
When they hug you it is not just one armed. They pull you in for a hug if you forget. They give you both arms. They send their warmth to you in that moment.
But when they really care; when they really have more than just simple emotions there will be this one extra thing. When you are in a room of their friends you will be able to notice that they treat you different. Their eyes center on you when they talk. Their speech lowers and takes on a tone of more seriousness and gentle kindness. It’s like they are dealing with a fragile piece of glass. They aren’t wasting a breath by talking to you. With everyone else they talk more dramatic to say the least. And you are the one they want others to meet.
They call when things get important. They don’t wait a while but rather they call right away when their thoughts are clear or when something comes up.
They want the best for you.
They check up on your family, they fill you in on things if you don’t know about them, and they consider themselves family too.
However, there will be moments that make you question whether they really care, or whether they just lost this sense of caring about you. You hit a low in life and you figure that that person will be there for you. They are there for everyone else and they have distinctly told you that they are there for you should anything happen. So when things do inevitably go down that tear you down and bring you to sadness, anger, frustration, and a sense of uselessness where are they? In your time of need are they by your side? Are they giving helping you to stand tall? Are they providing you a harbor to feel sheltered in your vulnerable state? Are they hugging you when you need the comfort?
When the phone goes silent and you don’t see them around does that mean they don’t care anymore? Seems like only ten seconds before that they showed emotion.
So was it all just a false sense of reality?
You may feel that but someone i know said it best. If you know that they are an amazing person, If you know deep down that yes they do care, then you know they don't mean to hurt you even if it does sting. Things may be complicated, confusing, frustrating, and hard. Life could be having its twists and turns with them as well.
All you can do in any situation, whether it be in a state of complication or a state of love, always show as much care as you possibly can. You reacting to stupidity shows you care. You coming to them in their time of need shows you care. You worrying about them shows you care. And by saying their name like it’s wrapped in sweet kisses, like pillows of clouds in the heavens, like hot chocolate on a rainy day, and like it’s the only flower in a field of weeds shows just how much you care.
Word. :) As always with you, your thoughts are really nicely put, and they (rightly) hold the significant people in our lives to high standards. We more than deserve these shapes of caring.
ReplyDeleteMy thoughts. Recently, I've been struggling with the question of untangling ambiguous caring. In my experience, a lot of the time - most of the time, maybe - caring is tangled up with fear, self-doubt and doubt of the other, drive, love of self, ambition. (I think you hit on this ambiguity in your second to last paragraph.) I've been struggling to come to terms with the realization that someone's prioritization of him or herself over me isn't mutually exclusive with his or her caring for me. Caring isn't necessarily hierarchical; people have needs, and their choice to fulfill those needs over being with me doesn't trivialize their caring.
Today in a stationary shop, I came across a card with a quote by Charles DuBois that reads, "The important thing is this: To be able at any moment to sacrifice what we are for what we could become." The quote was accompanied by (predictably) a photograph of a monarch butterfly, and although that combination is admittedly cliché, too cliché for $3.95, I spent a few minutes with the card in my hands, staring at the quote.
That is the important thing. Maybe not the important thing - importance suggests the hierarchy again - but the pressing thing. I don't want to believe that I could be part of what is rather than what is to be, but that refusal is just a symptom of my naivete. For some people in some circumstances, I belong and will belong to what needs to be sacrificed for who those need to become. That need for sacrifice has nothing to do with how much or how little they care for me. They may care for me, and they may not. But it would be selfish for me to assume that their refusal to be with me is a sign that they do not care. On the contrary: the act of sacrifice itself implies that they do care. Maybe, by giving me up for the people they could become, I am part of that process of their becoming, and they are taking me with them.
What's hard is then to be what is sacrificed. It's hard to get through with poise. I don't know what it means to sacrifice someone you care for in order to get ahead in life because to me I could never do that. I would rather kill all my energy and time to make the both work because I would think of that as a challenge and challenges enthrall me (maybe that's wrong). I just have a hard time to be selfish period.
ReplyDeleteI suppose where I meant to get at is that being sacrificed takes your own attempt at sacrificing something as well.
Already I have had this person sacrifice his or herself from my life in order for me to go through my own process of who I could become, who I thought I wanted to be, and perhaps where I should be in my life. I could be anything I want at this point in life and that decision is my own to make. However their motive was very genuine and thoughtful and caused me a bit of whiplash. People don't just do that. I understand my future is important and it's great they care but wow. And i have to admit i would probably do the same thing any day for anyone...but that's who i am. I'm a very intense person. Someone I'm close said it best by saying that there are few people I trust. But when I do I would walk through fire for them.
Hmm... right now in my head I am wondering if that means me and this person are one in the same.
Gosh. Its the attempt to convince the inner being that people care when everything else has created fear and doubt.