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Wealth

When you are remembered, even if just among a handful of family or friends or acquaintances, let it be for your decency. Know that all of us have faults, and that while we have had it drilled into us that we must endeavor to overcome them, that they are an intrinsic part of who and what we are. To despise such a real and natural part of ourselves only produces prisons of denial, and thus cities, nations, and continents of inmates.

We might be strangers you and I, but at what point does that deter our shared emotional realities from being exchanged? We all feel the same things, and yet the thought of honestly and openly conveying our emotions is seen as personal treason.

I remember it like it was yesterday. She leaned into the mini-van in which the band was waiting to return to the hotel. She grabbed my hand, looked me in the eyes, and thanked me for saving her life.

She was a complete stranger.

I had no idea how to react. I sat there in stunned silence as she quietly cried and smiled at me, my one hand firmly held between her two. It seemed as though hours passed between us, her standing silently on the curb, me awkwardly sitting in the seat nearest the door, my feet swung onto the running board, my bag in my lap.

And then, just as suddenly as it had happened, she dropped my hand, stepped back, security closed the door, and the van sped away.

I never saw that woman again, but on that night I became the wealthiest man in the world. And were I to have never written another note, sang another syllable, penned another story, or known another day, I would no doubt still perish from this earth contented.

Wealth is not measured by the size of houses, the speed of cars, the price of handbags, the trendy eateries and lounges frequented by celebrities, or the purity of the drugs that those who consider themselves fashionable funnel up their noses. That sort of wealth can be attained by simply being born the son or daughter of financially wealthy parents, climbing dirty ladders, or marrying someone.

Our acts determine our true wealth.

When someone says that they love you, and you know that they mean it to their very core, that there is no doubt in any cell in your entire body that they are unconditionally sincere – then you are wealthy. There is no question that, for a time, financial wealth can secure the placebo of love, but it cannot create it. It cannot manufacture true love, just as it cannot ensure or secure happiness. To give ourselves to others openly and honestly, and to conduct ourselves with integrity and concern for the feelings of others, even if complete strangers, represents the sum total of our riches.

As I sit here looking out the window, lost in the haze of summer twilight, memories, and the talons of despair, I see a city filled only with poor people.

And I wonder how that happened.

Aug 4, 06 - MG