Having had far more than my fair share of brushes with grief, loss, and torment nexuses, one thing I’ve always wished for was that someone, anyone would do something to ease the burden. And mercifully, I’ve found people who were willing to put in the effort now that I’m pushing 40. Does this mean I have people who can swoop in and prevent me from becoming homeless? Not always. People who can drive me to the ER at three am? Often not. But there is *always* something to do for those that look for it. In person options could be doing the dishes, or simply holding their hand while they make difficult phone calls. Sometimes it’s taking over on chores or taking the person out for dinner so they can get a break. Truth be told, the most impactful thing my friend did during this last moving crisis was simply take one load of boxes over to the new apartment every day after work. But this can be done for long distance friendships too— door dashing in meals every now and again, offering to pay for a cleaning service, setting up your own calendar reminders for their appointments so they don’t have to dedicate brain power to forgetting important Tasks. I’ve had friends from across the country send Lyfts when I was stranded, offer to order me lactaid when all my lactose intolerant ass could afford was boxed Mac and cheese, offer to buy me a yoga mat when they found out I was sleeping on the floor. But even more important than that was what the people who were also broke did to help. They talked to me, kept inviting me to sit with them in call, they let me cry. And when I was done crying, they’d throw up a stream so neither of us had to talk if we didn’t want to. YouTube marble races, the latest friend slop videogame, some Chinese girl who’s super into traditional cooking and has years worth of backlog videos to slap up when the nights are long, that new super gorey superhero show everyone’s talking about— the silence is less damning when you have people to share it with, and it’s even easier to cope when it’s not silent at all. I’ve had friends read me braum stokers Dracula so I didn’t have to cry in silence, I’ve had friends sit with me as I sewed and get hypnotized by my embroidery machine. Easily one of the most important free and long-distance tasks someone helped me with was finding a place to move *to*. They searched up disability advocacy and housing hotlines for me to call, and neatly organized their email addresses and telephone numbers so I didn’t have to wade through the websites myself. And you’d be surprised how little effort some of these things can take. We’re you just going to spend the night watching tv anyway? Scrolling through tumblr? Congratulations, you have a passenger now. Busy with work? One checkin, every night at ten oclock, just to pressure them to say one thing they’re proud of themselves for that day— even if it’s just drinking enough water or getting out of bed. Two sentences, that’s it.
There is always something to be done. And that’s not limited by money or proximity or even time. If you have any one of those resources, you can be the change you want to see in the world, even if it’s just by way of a post card with a low res clam taped to it.
