The status of the world.

[opposume]

I was reminded this weekend that one of the measures of humanity's character is (or rather should be) not doing something with expectations of return, but rather doing things because they are right and just. Friday a good friend of mine was in a car accident (he's more than OK, merely a fender bender) and his car was undrivable. I received a call from him asking me if I could pick him up. Well, as luck would have it, I was out with my wife, daughter, and mother in law and happened to be a few blocks up from where he was. So we spun around to get him. Now he merely wanted to hang at our place until his wife could either find a sitter for their three kids, or for her to pack them in the car and drive the hour to get to my place to pick him up. I would have none of this and offered to take him home to save from the trouble on their end. He would do this for me any time I needed it, and it was only right to help as I could. He offered to pay me gas money, buy me dinner, anything in return for the favor. Again, I would have none of it. But this got me to thinking. Has the world gotten so "me" centric that when one does a favor for someone else, that there is an immediate connotation of "repayment"? Have people gotten so selfish with their own time and resources that the only way they will do something is if they are compensated equally or more for what is put in? I would like to believe that if I were physically capable of helping any one of you, my friends, I would do so in a second with no other thought to repayment or reciprocation, but rather because it is the right and just thing to do. Well, enough of that rant, I will leave you with the lyrics to a song from Cirque Du Soleil: Zumanity

Love is beautiful,
Fierce and strong.
An insatiable, all-consuming fire.
A lion pacing on the red hot embers of desire.
Love is a thirst that’s never quenched,
A sacred flame that can’t be drenched by icy showers of sobriety
Or a society strangled by notions of propriety.
So what kind of love is this,
This love that dares not speak its name?
This love that hangs its head in shame?
Is this so-called love even worthy of its name?
True love doesn’t lie,
It doesn’t hide,
And it will never be denied
The right to sing its furious song in the sad, empty streets from dusk ‘til dawn.
Love laughs at fear
And cries out its name for all to hear.
Love is beautiful,
fierce and loud.
But most of all,
Love is proud.