Grinding out the Yards

Does the measure of misery in the world ever appreciably go up or down? A girlfriend from long, long ago observed to me, 'no matter who you are or your station in the world, there is always going to be someone who is better off and someone who is worse off than you are.' Not too profound, but compelling. If we are tempted to compare our lot with others, it is clear no one is in the absolute end of the scale, you can be sure of that. Remember that the next time you think life has dealt you a bad hand--and think about the poor bastard who has it worse than you do.

The misery in Haiti is deep-rooted. If anyone there thought they had it bad before, nothing like an earthquake and buildings crashing on the head to re-focus the degree of misery one can experience. So, the dead are dead, and many of the living will not survive. Most will be missed, many will be mourned, but it will be hard to find anyone who has a corner on loss. But the real challenge will be how the survivors, the ones with wounds and scars handle things. No one has any reason to believe their world will be 'fixed' by others. There is simply not enough aid in the world to bring Haiti back to where it was, including to what appears to be a relatively 'better' level of misery. What will those people do? How will they find joy? How will they sleep peacefully? When will they feel like bringing new children into the world? How long before they will want to make love tenderly with someone they hold dear?