The least I can do ...

I often talk to strange people in public places, people nobody else has an interest in listening to.

Others often ask "Why do you do it? Just walk away or send them away."

I usually say "Sometimes, people just need to be heard." I think about the people my sister and I used to visit with when we'd accompany our grandmother to the nursing home she worked at.  People have stories that just accumulate, and when you get to a certain age, you're eager to spend them before you die. It doesn’t hurt to stop for a few minutes and listen.

That's part of why I do it. Stories have their own lives that need to be respected, along with the person who shares them. It's like a little bubble of human experience we can breathe in, for their sake and for ours. We inhale it and it becomes a part of us.

That's nice. Sounds nice.

Last night, though ... 

Last night, it dawned on me, in the midst of karaoke, while I was talking with people who did – and didn’t – have interesting stories.

I started thinking again about the "why listen to them ramble" thing ...

Last night, I realized that I listen to people that others might not because I don’t want to risk being the last person they desperately tried to communicate with before deciding to go home, in their alienation, and kill themselves. Kind of dark, I know.

I've always thought that the most horrible death would be to die in space, on a mission to the Moon or Mars or a wherever mission, hundreds of thousands of miles from any human who would notice.

It fits. I can deal with being alone. It's just a thing I'm used to.

But I’d very much prefer not to be the reason someone would find themselves alone, adrift in space, hundreds of thousands of miles away from everyone else ...

So, the least I can do for them, and candidly, the very least I can do for myself, is listen.