Nobody - Both Audio and Text

I think it’s nice that people send each other friendly cards, or simply call on birthdays…or for Christmas…or Thanksgiving. And I’m so glad…when someone feels the need to show they care…it’s very easily done today, regardless where they’re living. But, when you have no family left, and all your friends have died - there are no cards or letters, and there are no friendly calls. So some will sit in nursing homes, in fear and desperation, and mark the hours they wait to die with every tear that falls. A very lonely patient in the tiny nursing home where I was working nights, part time, to pay my way through school, Buzzed me in one evening - after most had gone to sleep - and I assumed he prob’ly needed help to use the stool. His same redundant small talk…like so many nights before…launched my cold and patronizing sequence of replies To every all-too-common phrase I’d heard a zillion times, as…once again…I dodged his very sad and lonely eyes. But something slightly different in the way he spoke that night made me hear his comments. They were fraught with great disdain. Typically, a quiet man, with nothing much to say…I was quite surprised to hear this gentleman complain. “What have I to live for? Why…there’s not a soul on earth who’d give a damn if I should die. I might as well be dead.” His cold and desperate comments really took me by surprise, and caught me unprepared for how to cope with what he’d said. “You can’t really mean that,” I decisively replied. “Surely you have family somewhere. Think about it hard. I believe I’ve seen you on the phone from time to time, and there beside you, on the nightstand…isn’t that a card?” “Yes, I sometimes call,” he said, “but I don’t know their names. I simply dial a number, and pretend I’m phoning friends… Until they finally figure out it’s just some dumb old man, and hang up, quite disgusted…and the conversation ends. “As for what you see there on my nightstand…yes, it is, but I am sure you’d be surprised by whom the card is from. Every card I’ve got for years was sent by me - to me…and then I do my best to act delighted when they come. “I was born an orphan…and my foster folks are gone. I never had a sibling…and my friends were very few. The calls and cards are make believe, so, please forgive me, son…I actually only rang you in....so I could talk to you.” PS: I've now got 4 new Audio-CDs - @ 4 1/2 hours each = (62 diversely varied pieces). They’re listed on EBAY - under - “Mark Stellinga Poetry” - or available by simply contacting me at -- mark@writerofbooks.com -- should those of you who enjoy listening to poems as well as reading them - and particularly those of you that travel - care to be so entertained. (We use safe and simple - PayPal) Cheers, Mark