Your LifeStory (TM) caused me some actual tears, sir

I get LifeStory'd (TM) a lot.

What does that mean?  It means people see me in the grocery store/airport/gas station/walking down the street and they somehow decide that they should talk to me.  A lot.  About their whole life.  I know I've mentioned this before, but that's because it's a real think that happens to me.  Frequently.

And I don't mind.  People tell me that I'll get sick of it, and I'll get jaded, and start presenting an unfriendly face to the world, and... I might.  I hope I don't, but I might.  But for now, people LifeStory (TM) me and I don't particularly mind.

So yesterday, when I was at the mechanic (because yes, I do the car stuff.  Two oil changes, a spare tire, and two brake issues within the past week and a half, if that says anything) this older fellow started talking to me.  This is nothing surprising--they all talk to me.

(I'm not being vain or anything--in fact, in all fairness, I'd usually rather be reading a book than talking to a stranger about his LifeStory (TM), so don't think any virtuous thoughts of me--but people just do talk to me. It's not that I think I'm a magnet for humans, I just...  have that kind of face.  Or something.)

Anyhow, he began by asking if I was waiting long (he'd seen me there earlier with another car, when he first got there, and thought I'd been there for forever.  Which...  basically I was, but only because I brought up three cars in the same morning, haha) and then was talking about how his car didn't have many miles on it, because he doesn't get out much, because he's old, mostly, and his wife had a stroke a while ago and it's hard for her to travel.  I could tell this was building towards something.  People always feel you out to see if you have time, and then when you present your, "Yes, I'm listening," face, they just roll right towards their story.

And I know, this is where I could call it quits.  I didn't have to put my book in my purse when he started talking to me.  I didn't have to get him a drink of water when I saw him struggling up to try to get it himself, but I just couldn't help it.  I'm not sure which comment did me in--the "It's all the radiation treatments I've gotten have just worn me out," or the "My hip replacement from two years ago just didn't take."  Either way, this man needed somebody to help him up and get him his water.  And that's a fact.

Once I got him water, though, we were pals.

So I settled in to hear his story.  Which he told.

Before I tell any of it, I just want to say that usually people tell me their story and I'm like, "Wow, I'm so sorry," or "That's incredible!" and try to throw something in there about the Lord and we go our merry ways.  Very rarely do I actually feel some sort of real pain/sympathy for the person because...  well, I don't know them.  I'm not trying to sound awful, but once I've had the conversation, our time is up.  Chances of us meeting again are slim.  (Unless you're the crazy lady I met at our library who I think sometimes STALKS me because of how often I see her.  But...  she needs the Lord, so I never turn her down when she sees me on the street--how does she always find me??--and asks for a ride to work and stuff.  So we talk and she's still not saved but we're working on it.)

Anyhow, as I said--usually I just enjoy the fact that I can gospel these folks and move right along my way.

So this man started talking about how his wife didn't like him to do yard work, because sometimes he falls and can't get up (it's the bum hip again) and his son-in-law is always like, "I wish my wife would tell me not to do yard work!" and they always get a big laugh out of it.  Well...  step-son-in-law.  This is his second wife he was talking about.  His first wife, he told me, died a few years ago.  Unexpectedly.

She'd had RA for years, and had a number of health problems.  She also had occasional heart problems, and one day she was having heart arrhythmia and so they went into the hospital, and he was sitting in the waiting room, waiting for the cardiologist to come out and let him know if they needed to do anything about it.  Then someone came up to him and addressed him by name, and identified himself as the hospital chaplain.  "This is such a strange hospital," he thought to himself, "that the chaplain knows my name for no reason."

But of course, it wasn't for no reason.  His wife had died.  Out of the blue.  They were in their early 70s, and (besides the serious RA) doing pretty well.  But there he was, sitting along in the waiting room.  They didn't think it was a big deal--they hadn't even thought to call any family members when they brought her into the ER.  Nobody was there with him, and they all lived too far away to call.  Besides, he wasn't a cell phone man, and this was seven years ago.  He didn't have a cell phone, and he didn't carry their kids's numbers on him anyhow.  He is the Lord's, so he wasn't totally alone, but...  sometimes you wish you had another human presence with you.  Someone to take your arm, walk you to where you need to go, and take care of the little things that feel so insurmountable when sorrow strikes.

So they let him come back and see her body.  They gave him her watch and her purse.  He had his moment of sorrow, and when it was done, found his car in the parking garage, got into their car by himself, and drove himself home to their empty house, looking over at the purse that was on her seat--the only part of her that came home with him from the hospital.

And then...  he didn't know what to do.  He called the kids, but they were all far enough away that they didn't get there right away.  Their friends were too old to come in at a moment's notice.  He puttered, and saw on the calendar that she had some appointments coming up, so he called up the doctor's office to cancel them.  "Why are you cancelling an appointment four months early?" the secretary queried.  He explained--"My wife.  She died."--and that was it.  In that moment when he had to say it out loud he let the sorrow overtake him.

He said he was a broken man that day.

Um, you think?  By this point he was crying, and so was I.  We did eventually move on to stories about his grandkids, and the new wife, and how he met said wife number two, and what it was like to move away to his house of 47 years to a new home, and the fact that wife number two had suffered from a stroke just two years ago.  We no longer were crying.  We mopped up our tears and moved on.  Just like in life.  Sorrows come, but...  so do grandkids.  And mundane grocery shopping experiences.  But sometimes there are moments when the tears catch up with you and you need to find a stranger with whom to cry.  And this is my point--I don't usually cry during these sessions.  People will tell me terrible things they've suffered--loss, abuse, trauma, and I sympathize, give them a shoulder to cry on, and walk away extra thankful for my life.

But this man.  Something about his story hit me.  I almost never cry with strangers.  I think the people at the mechanic were surprised as well--they see me in there all the time (if they had a need for somebody to do nothing but answer phones, I would be hired, as they remind me all the time), people chatting me up, and usually I'm friendly and polite, but I don't usually cry.  When it came time for him to go I helped him up and once he was gone they asked me if I knew him.  No.

Or rather, I didn't used to.

But for a few brief moments, he needed to talk.  And in those moments, I listened.  And he didn't just talk, he sorrowed so deeply for a love that was lost.  For the pain of being alone.  And in that moment, I was there.

And I didn't know him before, and I'll probably never see him again, but in that one moment, anyhow, I knew him.