by Dale Gustafson
I have a deep disdain for morons who insist on saying, "You're
lucky, things could be worse." These
are the people who greet you at the emergency room where you've gone to have
stitches or a broken arm set, or the people who stand on the shore next to you
as you watch the ocean sweep your house out to sea.
In fact, even someone in your own family is probably one of these idiots.
They masquerade as someone concerned for your welfare, but they are
actually there to twist the knife in your wound.
It was about twenty years ago when my entire life was at its lowest ebb.
My father died, he had been retired for about a year and we were just
getting to know each other again. I
had just gone through a divorce that had virtually bankrupt me, both financially
and emotionally. My employer
decided to cut his expenses by laying me off, and greeted me with the news the
day I returned from a successful business trip.
When I arrived home, after being away for three weeks, I discover that my
house had been burglarized and vandalized.
During the divorce, it had taken every cent I had to hold on to the small
old house and a few sticks of furniture. It
was all I had, and now it was gone.
After the police reports and an examination of how extensive the damage
was, I sat down on what was once a sofa and now only a pile of wood, torn
leather and yellow stuffing. I used
a cheap plastic phone I had borrowed from a neighbor's teen-ager to call my
Friend Dan, who had been taking care of my dog.
At least the dog would be glad to see me and be some comfort.
I told Dan of the home destruction, he already knew my other problems.
He said he'd be right over.
The home was now a collection of graffiti painted walls and destroyed
furniture. What the punks couldn't
steal or didn't want, they destroyed. There
was a dead cat in the refrigerator and human feces spread throughout every room
in the place. There were holes in
the plaster, burns in the carpet and every personal valuable I had collected in
the military and as a civilian was either destroyed or stolen.
Apparently this had gone on for a number of days, and my wonderful
neighbors never noticed a thing.
I was devastated. I sat
there for more than an hour with a variety of emotions running through me.
I was mad; angry enough to kill the punks who did this.
I was deeply hurt and wanted comfort, but I had no one, and that made the
sadness that much deeper. I was
even confused, wondering what I would do next and how I would put the pieces of
my life back into some semblance of order.
I had no clothes other than what I had carried with me on the business
trip, no money, and no job.
A car pulled up and I heard the familiar bark of my old dog.
He was nothing more than a mutt I had gotten from the pound, but he had
been a good companion over the years. He
was old, but he still waged his tail and loved to be at my side.
His name was Roman because when he was a puppy, he had a tendency to roam
around the neighborhood and visit everyone.
He was a big dog, a mix of Doberman and Black Lab, but he was gentile
enough to play with small children and old people.
He had only one fault, he would eat until he exploded if you let him.
Old Roman trotted in the open side door of the house and came to an
immediate halt. His eyes got big as
he looked around the room in doggy disbelief.
I'm sure he was thinking that someone was in real trouble, he probably
had vivid memories of how he was punished for chewing on a leg for the coffee
table and couldn't imagine what the punishment for this type of damage would be.
After the momentary shock, he realized that I had returned and he rushed
over to greet me.
Roman loved to be hugged and at that moment in time, I needed to hug him
more than anything else in the world. Regardless
of everything that had happened to me in my life, Roman was there to be my
friend.
Dan walked into the house and was shocked at the damage.
"I've never seen anything like it," he exclaimed.
In his vain effort to console me, he made that stupid remark that so many
unthinking morons have a tendency to say in such a situation.
"You're lucky," said Dan, "it could have been worse."
"I'm lucky?" I
replied with a sarcastic tone, "Things could be worse?"
Dan just stood there with a dumbfounded look on his face.
"Tell me Dan," I snapped, "tell me how things could be any
worse?"
At that very moment, Roman gave out a strange sounding yelp, fell to his
side and went into convulsions. Dan
and I rushed him to the Veterinary Hospital where he died about an hour later.
I consider myself an emotionally strong person.
During the past few months my father had died, I had gone through a
terrible divorce, lost my job, and
the house had been ransacked. Through
it all I never shed a tear, not until the vet told me that Roman was dead.
It was the final blow to my wall against emotions and everything came
out. I started crying and couldn't
stop, I was so full of rage and pain that I had to strike out against
something... I put my fist through
the wall of the Vet's office.
It was now my turn to be rushed to the hospital, my right hand was badly
cut and some minor bones were broken. I
was set in a small cubical where an overworked intern treated my wound and sent
me on my way. Dan had made the
unfortunate decision to wait for me.
Dan and I were in the hospital parking lot heading for the car when Dan
made another vain attempt to make me feel better.
"You know," he stammered, "you're lucky, it could have
been worse."
I dropped Dan with a left hook to the jaw.
