Famine & Feast

A tale of foul weather friends

You stop.

You've been working the dry dust of this field for hours this day.

And days this month.

And months this year.

Famine. 

The ground is dry, the air is dry, the sky is dry, even what little water you have is dry. 

Scraps, morsels. Empty, sick.

Sweat rolls down into your eyes, causing your eyes to roll themselves.

So easy to make sweat, why so difficult to make water? 

The well is dry. The cow is starved. Sometimes licking a cool stone gives the illusion of satisfied thirst, if only for a moment. Never mind staving off starvation.

Just one plant

One sprout

One sign

That's all I want

You look to the sky, but it's hard to look at. It's just white. No blue. No clouds. Just bright, and hot, and white.

You look down at the field. Riddled with stones and twigs and dry grass. So different from the rich soil you dreamt of when you left to build your farm.

This wasn't soil. 

This is dirt. 

You drop your tools. A rolling puff of dust rushes up to strangle you, turning any moisture left in you to dry, baked mud.

You sit down. Another cloud of dust. The only clouds you have seen in months now. 

A deep sigh

A single, wasted tear

A hopeless chuckle

I need help.

It's embarrassing really. No, not needing help. Everyone needs help sometimes. No, it was the reaching out that was embarrassing. Because you knew your friends would come.

They'd come in droves, bringing workers and mules and food and dogs and tools and great, healing tubs of that life-giving water. They would stay, until they cherished that field to the point it would be shameful for it to not take up seed. 

Everyone would smile, would be glad to help, glad you reached out, glad to see progress. They would laugh, and sing and dance together. The field would flourish and grow, and then they would build a barn and bring in the harvest. Bushels and bushels of delicious grain. They wouldn't take any, wouldn't hear of it. One by one, filing in, dropping their loads with bright smiles until the barn was near bursting. 

Celebrations were in order. Wine, bread, cakes, vegetables, milk, meat! Anything and everything one could desire.

As you sit down at the table, the goblets full, the food steaming, the bountiful feast set before them.

No one was there

The crickets chirped, the owl called, the fat cow lowed in the distance. The food grew cold, the wine and bread stale. Each and every seat empty but your own.

There was no one to share it. They had all gone home, to share each other's company.

No. Still in your field, you wipe your brow, still somehow sweating in the parched dirt of your barren field.

If they truly cared, they'd already have been here.

It would be easy to get help, but so terribly lonely to see them go again. Not that you weren't grateful, it's always good to know you have help in hard times. 

But also destructive to realize that these same friends only notice you when you are begging for help, when you have already broken, when you have already lost everything.

As you stand and retrieve your tools, a single question furrows your brow, pressing your lips into a grim line. As you set to work once more, digging into the dust for any sign of life, a single question freezes your heart, and turns your tears to stone.

What kind of friends get through the famine, but then do not stay for the feast? 

...

The concept touched on in this piece is not a common experience. Some might even find it completely unrelatable.

Everyone has heard the term "fair-weather friends", and unfortunately, most have experienced them. It refers to friends who are around to take advantage of the good times in life, fun, joy, love etc., but they are conveniently absent during the bad.

Growing up in the church, I had the exact opposite problem. My parents were deeply connected and my family was close. There were pastors and ministries and counselors and people who specifically volunteered to be there in hard times. Grandparents, aunts & uncles, and cousins were there to support you. Family and friends would always be there to bail you out.

I am so grateful for these people and these support systems.

I could never begrudge someone whose desire is to help others. I know I am blessed with a family that most in our country dream of. I wouldn't trade that for anything.

But, there are extremes, and my extreme was the opposite of the common experience.

Growing up unwanted and isolated by my peers, it became hard to accept help from them. It's difficult knowing that people only think about you, notice you when you are suffering.

They kept me alive, but they didn't live life with me.

I resented having to ask for their help. To reach out and beg for attention and assistance when I had all but been ignored since my last disaster? It was demeaning.

I wanted to be thought of, invited, chosen. I wanted to have fun with these people, enjoy their company, be wanted, be loved. To create good memories together, to be friends.

But instead, I am the hard-times friend.

If they had been there during the good times, they would have noticed when times got tough.