Friday, July 22, 2005

Here it is, your moment of Zen

From Ben Stein:
"Loneliness hurts like the cut of a knife. Mine is only the smallest pinprick. I'll see my wife again soon, if all's well. But what about the Army and Marine wives who go to sleep in their king-sized beds alone for a year? What about the Navy Seal's wife who just heard that her husband will not be coming home from Afghanistan? Or the man who never learned to make a bed and now his wife is gone forever and he's eating out of a can watching a TV show he can't even hear? Or the child whose father will never teach him how to bat a ball or parallel park because he's in a military cemetery?

Our lives are measured by what we do for others, not by how much money we make. Spending time with lonely people, military families, widows, widowers, this is a pretty easy way to make a huge difference in a suffering human life. So when you think of your uncle who just lost his aunt, when you think of the woman down the street whose husband was just called up by the Guard and sent to Iraq, don't just think about them: ask them out to dinner. Invite them to a barbecue. Just call them up to gossip.

People are always asking me for stock tips because they think I know something about the market. Usually, I don't. But I do know this. Sharing company with a lonely man or woman or child is about as good an investment in your own net worth as a human being as you can make."

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