wow
what a depressing night. i work as an usher at the concert hall on campus and the only people that work there are students and the elderly. so tonight i had to sit out of the show with barbara who is... eh, in her early 70s i guess. i asked her if she had any kids, cause usually the old ladies loooove talkin about their families. barbara has no family. like... none. she never got married (which kind of perked my ears, cause of course i think everyone is gay) and never had kids. her parents are dead. she had two brothers, and one of them she loved dearly. she started crying when she was talking about him, how she misses him and how shes paid for her burrial plot and its next to his. she talked about how to worked at the Pentagon in DC for 30 years and the did odd jobs and now she's struggling to pay the rent between her job as an usher (which pays a whopping $6.50) and her job at Wal-Mart. Social security doesn't even come close to covering the cost of liveing in northern VA. the conversation got so depressing, her whole family is dead, not to mention they all lived in Boston. i finally got her to talk about something happy, she did dog shows and had two basset hounds that won in competitions all over the US and in Canada. but she had to put them down eventually. so they're gone too. this woman's life is so sad, and now she has nobody. i couldn't imagine being all alone in the world like that, how scared she must be of dying. shes already paid for her plot and her headstone, and now shes trying to save up enough money to "get her home" to boston to be burried next to her brother. i thought i was going to cry. it kind of makes me scared too, i mean... i'll probably never be married. i hope to have children someday but that's not that easy, and it could possibly never happen. i mean, i hope to god i don't end up 70 and alone, but i'm sure barbara didn't plan it that way either. i wanted to help her, do something. but i mean, what can you do? i was thinking maybe when i go home over the summer i could write to her. but that seems so small and insignificant. and to think that there are old people out there like her, i mean what if she looses her job at wal-mart or gets to old to drive? where's she gonna go? and who's gonna care? i know there are a million sob stories out there... i mean just look at extreme home makover with tye... aka the modern day jesus- a savior and a carpenter. but i ran into a sob story and it just got me thinkin i guess.