Look for the Helpers

Mr. Rogers' quote about 'looking for the helpers' has gone viral since news of the Boston Marathon bombings yesterday. Three reported dead, well over one hundred injured, including loss of limbs.

Mr. Rogers:
“When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me, 'Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping."

Actor-comedian Patton Oswald also had a social media post go viral:
"... So when you spot violence, or bigotry, or intolerance or fear or just garden-variety misogyny, hatred or ignorance, just look it in the eye and think, 'The good outnumber you, and we always will.'"

These are both optimistic, hopeful perspectives in the wake of tragedy, terrorism. It's got me thinking about "good," "helping," "kindness," etc.

I've always considered myself someone who likes to help others. I've volunteered since I was 14 years old, starting in an assisted living facility reading stories to the sick and elderly, followed by work at a juvenile detention facility doing intakes and serving on a community panel, and then group facilitation at the Dougy Center with grieving children/families, and again volunteering with a similar organization in Eugene during graduate school. The professions garnering my interest are usually "helping professions," such as mental health, education, healthcare. I am now a speech language pathologist, my work's purpose to aid those with impaired communication, swallowing and cognition. I'm proud to be employed in a public service, married to a public high school teacher.

But run-of-the-mill helpful does not equal heroic.

Am I the person that runs toward the burning building rather than away? Do I grow strong in the face of fear? I don't think so. I wish I could say I was that type of person, but I think had I been near the marathon finish line - or at Clackamas mall, in the Aurora movie theater, or even at the Twin Towers - I would have run far, and I would have run fast. Fight or flight? Flight, fo sho. I'm not cut out for heroism or survival. I'm a big chicken when it comes to scary shit. But I so admire, envy even, those who aren't - whether out of courage or stupidity - because they can at least know that they tried to help.

As for helpfulness and kindness, I, too, believe that, ultimately, it outnumbers, outweighs, and out-powers evil. Because without some faith in the power of goodness, what are we left with?

Like every other parent in the nation, I think I'll hug my kid extra EXTRA tight tonight.