“For none of us lives to himself alone.” – Romans 14:7
After all these many years I still think often about Rookh Richards, a lady who lived around the block from us in my small hometown when I was growing up, and how in her quiet little way she influenced my life. We had this interesting bond, Rookh and I, even though she was a generation older than my parents, and I was just a young kid of about ten or eleven. Every afternoon for exercise Rookh would take a brisk walk around our neighborhood, so if I happened to be playing in the yard and saw her coming my way I would stand and wait for her to come by where we would engage in this brief little banter, some sort of teasing, about what I don’t remember. Whatever it was we would both laugh as she scooted off to finish her walk.
While Rookh was certainly a beloved neighbor and well-known by our family, yet she was not part of what I would consider our family’s inner circle. A great lady though she was for sure – warm, kind, and generous, a fine citizen, married to a prominent rancher, and always a quiet supporter in church and civic affairs, one of the “grand ladies” in our community back in her day. But what I remember most was her sense of humor, and how our relationship was formed by teasing each other – about who knows what!
“No man is an island,” the poet John Donne famously wrote. What the poet was expressing I think is that no matter who we are, where we live, what we do, whether rich or poor, young or old, male or female, outgoing or shy, educated or not, we all touch the lives of others we encounter one way or another. Realizing that, we each have an opportunity, even in the briefest and most casual circumstances, to influence and leave a lasting impression, either for good or not so good. My relationship with Rookh was certainly brief and casual, probably no more than twenty or thirty seconds each time she passed by our house. Yet, for me she left a lasting impression in how one’s warmth, friendliness, and sense of humor can be used in a positive way.
Rookh passed away when I was in high school, and I still remember sitting in her funeral service teary-eyed, mourning the loss of my friend and those brief, casual encounters that will never be forgotten. As the Apostle Paul says, “For none of us lives to himself alone and none of us dies to himself alone.” Rookh certainly didn’t. And neither do we.