The human capacity to love.

It was Sunday night in D.C. in early spring. Reality was settling in that the work week would start afresh in the morning, and a debate was going on in my head of whether I should go to bed early (should do) or soak up the last remaining hours of the weekend reading or catching up with friends (what I really wanted to do).

But what I did instead was stay up well past 2 am, learning a lesson I have since thought back to many times. The experience helped me realize the capacity we have to love as humans is a beautiful thing, and is certainly one of our most defining characteristics.Talk about unexpected! And formative and wonderful.

My roommates at the time were a smattering of characters. We were very different. We were each pretty darn independent, and while for the most part we got along, I never became very close to them. In many ways we only knew each other on artificial, insincere level. A “How was work?” “What are your plans after your internship?” “What are you doing this weekend?” type of friendship.

But this particular Sunday night, I learned for the first time that an aunt of one of my roommate’s had recently been diagnosed with cancer. I felt guilty when I heard that my roommate had silently dealt with the worry and fear of her aunt’s condition for weeks. Her aunt’s condition had unexpectedly worsened that particular weekend, and had been rushed to the hospital and admitted to the intensive care unit at home in Utah.

Stuck on the other side of the country, my roommate was completely distraught that Sunday night and nearly beside herself. She was disconnected from her tight-knit family and the small- town community where she had grown up, desperately wanting to know how her aunt was doing.

As each of us roommates learned what was happening, we slowly gathered in the living area, awkwardly surrounding our roommate - a girl I felt I didn't really even know- in an attempt to be a comfort and support. While she waited for a text or a call- any kind of update on her aunt’s condition- we just listened as she described the cancer as well as her relationship with her aunt: that she had been like a second mother to her growing up, that she had been supportive of her school and sports, and that she couldn’t bear the idea of losing her.

After a few tense minutes of waiting, a phone call came. Her sister, I think, calling with an update. And it was clear instantly what the message was. Her aunt had just passed away. In this critical moment, it was like the dam or wall that was holding my roommate’s composure and trust that it would all work out just broke. She wailed and sobbed and pulled herself into a ball, and her face went into her hands. 

While it was incomparable to what she was feeling, for a moment I felt an ounce of the agony and grief she was experiencing. I felt so bad, and I just watched in sincere pity as my roommate, literally reeling in pain from the news, cried and cried and tried to cope and grasp that her loved one had finished her journey on earth.

But strangely, my feeling of pity and sadness was very brief, and what I felt next was surprising and almost seemed inappropriate. What I felt was awe and a strange kind of gratitude that I had never felt before. It was like I was lifted out of that terrible scene in that nasty internship apartment in Arlington, Virginia, and I was taught this unforgettable lesson:

It is a beautiful, wonderful thing that human beings are capable of having so much love for another person to experience such intense emotions when they are gone.

That powerful moment, us surrounding her trying to sympathize, me feeling this gratitude and awe, only lasted a few minutes. Once she had gained composure, she spent some time alone and then booked a flight home that night. We spent a few hours packing up her room, and she was gone before any of us even woke up the next morning. And I haven’t seen her since.

I will always be grateful for that Sunday night in D.C. to have witnessed such poignant and pure human emotion. I am sorry that it was at the expense of another person’s grief, but it offered a window into humanity and was an exhibition of the divine characteristics humans possess to love, cherish and grieve for their fellow human beings. It’s an experience I will always remember.