I was at my dad's for a couple days and I had long periods of isolation in which to think. For long moments, I was very pessimistic marveling at the fact that we are born basically alone and we basically die alone and that every man actually is an island and we will never find that someone who truly bridges us to another person. It was incredibly sad to think about. The thought of dying and being mourned for a period of time and then forgotten and the sorrow that followed in my own heart was... disheartening.
And then Platy woke up from her nap and begged me to take her for a walk. Letting her grab onto my two pointer fingers, she uses me for support while she strolls around the house.
We ventured outside.
At the front of our house (although we treat it like the back) there are long and treacherous stairs that take you from the front door to the driveway. They're creaky, tall, and generally foreboding particularly at night or in the rain.
Platy must have been feeling brave because we saunter right up to the tippy top and the edgy edge of those stairs and she swings her foot out, over the edge. Then she swings again and drops her toe just a little bit down. She bends her other knee and I can feel her tiny paws grip harder on my fingers.
Both of us are nervous. Both of us are nervous about the same thing.
Even though my hands are getting a little sweaty, I double my grip and I say, "Don't worry Platy, I've got you. I won't let go."
And she does it! She finally touched the next step with her toe and with a bravehearted effort, she drops her other foot.
Platy literately squealed with excitement. She looks up at me with ginormous eyes that could suck up the whole world and spit it out a shiny blue. The next step she takes has much more courage behind it although her grip has not loosened from my fingers. Even if it had, mine would be all the more tighter.
Two steps down, things change.
The stairs are just planks of wood and you can see all the way down to the bottom. Poor Platy sees how high up she is and gets terrified. It's too much for her. Even her last two triumphs are not enough to let her go the rest of the way. She is absolutely paralyzed with fear and nothing can move her.
I can feel her tremble and can sense how utterly helpless she feels before this giant void that is just waiting to devour her.
At this moment, she must feel so alone, so small in such a large world where there is nobody to help her and hold her. There is just teeny tiny her and a great big scary world.
So I pick her up and hold her close and we walk back to the house. She wouldn't let me put her down for a while and I wouldn't have. I was going to be there for her as long as she needed me and even longer.
Even though she felt like it, she was never alone. I was there holding her hand and will always be there for her. Which means nobody is ever really alone.
