Feeling Outraged

I became friends with D a few years ago when we were working on the same team. She was quietly competent and had a lot of empathy for those struggling to get their part done in what was a monstrous undertaking. We got through the last hurdles and many left the company completely spent from the work that had taken up all the space in their lives for close to two years. D had it a lot easier than most given the nature of her work. The company in question has gotten a lot harder to survive in since that time and some of the folks we both knew from the time are still there and are hanging by a thread. The market conditions make a job change much harder now than a few years ago when that large exodus happen. D and I caught up after a long time recently and she is fortunately still shielded from the what most of our peers are going through.

Talking to her left me more than a little outraged. She is completely oblivious to the plight of the others who unlike her have option but to follow the rules from which she has been forever exempt. D's demeanor is that of someone living in a quaint bungalow surrounded by a lovely garden where everything grows in abundance. She has no concept of want or hunger because the garden is so giving. She also never has to be exposed to the elements because her home is perfectly comfortable. Everyone else though lives a few miles away from her, far enough that she never has to see them. Their homes have been mostly destroyed, they have no food and they have no better place to go. They are scavenging around to get what they can and rebuild their lives. Its been a a very long time since they lived in a functional home or had a garden that fed them. The irony is D and all these people in who are in a fight for their lives all work for the same company. 

Her lack of understanding of the majority's reality really bothered me. She is still the same person and it is not her fault that she has been isolated from the larger destruction. Those people are likely not sharing much about their lives with her because she is an outsider to their collective struggles. I am not in either side but my sympathies definitely lie with the figuratively dispossessed who are trying to make it work despite monumental struggles because there are no options out there. 

D remarked that I looked downcast toward the end of our conversation. She is still a good friend and I did not want to tell her that was me looking disappointed in her. I want to believe time will bring clarity to her and I both so that we see the situation in a different light.