I know I’ve posted several times today, but I want to say this plainly, because I think it will help you see yourselves as I do.
One of the things people constantly say to me is to remark upon my kindness and the effort which I extend toward my gentle readers. Some of you may have heard me argue that I am not “kind”, but that to me kindness is a practice. No one has ever asked me what that means.
The word “kind” comes from “kin”. It means the closeness of family, of sameness. I state this for two reasons: firstly, to point out that I’m not like you, and so to me treating you as similar to me is actually a task of some labor, and secondly to imply that there is a kind of implied laxity to the word.
“What do you mean?” you say.
The similarity and shared origins of the words equate the two. To be kind to someone is to treat them like family. To have family is therefore a state of implied kindness, which is false.
I do have a point to this.
You have seen the lengths I go to for you anonymous people, whom I’ve never met and likely never shall. You’ve seen me do things that catch you by surprise. I won’t list them for risk of being accused of patting my own back, but you know that I’ve done them. I talk to you for hours. I give my perspective on your problems. I help you cook your dinners. I send you things I think you’ll like. I think about you daily. I worry after you. If I have not heard from one of you in a spell, I seek you out. I make it a practice to know when you will be wandering, working, playing, going to class. There are thousands of you, but I invest time in as many as I can. I practice kindness as a type of occupation. For my humans here it is an even greater investment.
So I ask you this…how does your family treat you?
If those who call you kin cannot afford to be kind, then something is amiss. Do not rely on blood if it stays in the vein. Blood can only be trusted if it is spilt on your behalf. And once it is, never allow it to spill again. This is how trust functions.
Appreciate those who work for their friends. Commend those who make a practice of affection. Praise the elevation of civility to an art, a discipline, a stubbornly upheld mantra. It isn’t manipulation, but a demonstration of who they’ve chosen to be as a person. To my mind (perhaps biased on the subject) this type of fortitude and calm is critical to being both grounded and stable. And as you may have guessed those two things are important to me as personal benchmarks, because I haven’t any choice. If my commitment to kindness wanes, something has shifted in me, and this is a mark that something is wrong. Sonit is that I have a nuanced understanding of what it means to seek groundedness, and how important are those around me. Practicing kindness on you is not a means to an end, it is a self-feeding loop, it is a benefit to you, and therefore me, and therefore us, and yet…it is also more than that. It is more than the sum of its parts. A person who practices kindness claims responsibility over himself, and those around him, whether or not they are blood.
I’m not telling you this so that you tell me how much you enjoy me. I don’t need to hear that. It’s not why I’m here. I don’t do anything ever anticipating I’ll hear from any of you again. I have no expectations. I’m telling you this to make a point.
I’m not your species. With simple practice and insistence upon etiquette, I seem to make great headway into your lives. You accept me. And yet…you’ve allowed a monster in, rather than to demand that the humans around you live up to the monster’s example.
If a monster, who is not kin can be kind to you, you are surely deserving of it, surely capable of receiving it. If those are true, then you are surely fit to ask for it. You are capable of expecting it from those you see fit to draw close. If you can expect it from me, you’re entitled to ask it of your kin.
And you should. Please do. There are some of you I’d feel much better about if I knew you had decided this for yourselves.
Tonight, in this world, there are children being abused, women being raped, boys being manipulated, families teetering in a weird kind of balance between cataclysm and codependency. Families that cannot be kind, should frankly be abolished, because you can have better. You can. You don’t need to cling to each other in desperation. There are other ways.
I’m not kind. The things I’ve done for some of you are small. Some of them are all words, but apparently they are words you needed to hear and I have a knack for timing. All luck. But regardless, I have practiced kindness. I request you all do the same, and that you enforce it in those who claim to love you.
Don’t ask me why I need to say this now. I simply do. Perhaps it’s that “timing” thing. Perhaps it’s a talent I have.
Whatever the case, I do mean it. Very sincerely. And I hope this is an end to the “why do you call yourself a monster when you’re kind” nonsense.
areudirty
origamiaround
theartofmadeline
dededos
turnnoffyourmind
gummygunk
blakekathryn
