Somebody

Somebody

   We all want to be somebody.  To be remembered or respected or recognized or loved.  And it goes way back, way past the Jefferson Airplane and their singing "Don't You Want Somebody to Love."  For being somebody works both ways; what we want, others want...to be somebody, to just simply be somebody to someone.

   There was a story in the Bucks County Courier Journal some years ago.  It was about somebody.  His name was Harry O'Neill. He was a pro baseball player, pitched one inning, never went to bat.  But he loved, absolutely loved baseball.  Truth is, he became the seed of a similar story, one which led to the 1989 film, Field of Dreams.  But Harry O'Neill didn't become famous, even if he was and is still just one of only two professional baseball players to have died in combat during WW II.  Says the paper's story, Harry is remembered..."in dust-covered boxes of microfilm that contain blurry replicas of broadsheets and tabloids, in a Pennsylvania college's archive, and in the fading memories of memories of old men."  Harry, you see, was shot by a sniper on Iwo Jima.  He was 27.

    Harry isn't the exception.  Time passes quickly and we all have those moments where we ponder if we'll be remembered, if we'll be thought of by someone once we have passed on.  Sometimes this is triggered by a close call or an accident...we choke on something, a car nearly clips us, we pull a back muscle, we get an abscess in our tooth.  But sometimes it's triggered by something far simpler...an innocent laugh from a little girl, a pair of newlyweds walking on a path, an elderly woman sitting on a bench.  We look back and think, am I somebody?

   In a talk by Ash Beckham on TED Talks, the subject came up of coming out of the closet.  But she talks about many closets, closets that we all live in.  I think we all have closets.  Your closet may be telling someone you love her for the first time, or telling someone that you're pregnant, or telling someone you have cancer, or any of the other hard conversations we have throughout our lives.  All a closet is is a hard conversation, and although our topics may vary tremendously, the experience of being in and coming out of the closet is universal.  It is scary, and we hate it, and it needs to be done...So really, my closet is no different than yours or yours or yours.  Sure, I'll give you 100 reasons why coming out of my closet was harder than coming out of yours, but here's the thing: Hard is not relative.  Hard is hard.  Who can tell me that explaining to someone you've just declared bankruptcy is harder than telling someone you just cheated on them?  Who can tell me that his coming out story is harder than telling your five-year-old you're getting a divorce?  There is no harder, there is just hard.  We need to stop ranking our hard against everyone else's hard to make us feel better or worse about our closets and just commiserate on the fact that we all have hard.  At some point in our lives, we all live in closets, and they may feel safe, or at least safer than what lies on the other side of that door.  But I am here to tell you, no matter what your walls are made of, a closet is no place for a person to live.

   And her advice is simple.  Be Authentic (Take the armor off. Be yourself.).  Be Direct (Just say it.).  And Be Unapologetic (You are speaking your truth. Never apologize for that.).  Those are simple guidelines, sometimes easy to follow, sometimes no so easy to follow.  We get tested, we get regrets, we begin to wonder.  But often behind the scenes, we are all making a difference...maybe not always good, but we are making a difference.  Something as simple as a smile, or an extra dollar on a tip tray, or an acknowledgement, or a thank you...each and every one can make a difference, ever so slight, but it might be all that is needed in that person's day.

   We don't have to be a professional baseball player or a movie star or a world leader.  Eventually, we will all become just a faded picture on someone's cabinet or counter, and not long after, an unrecognizable face to a great, great grandchild, a stranger for all intents and purposes.  But maybe by just being a parent, or just being nice, or just being ourselves...we turn into somebody.  And that might be all that life is really about.