On Pity

Is there a difference between feeling sorry for someone or taking pity on someone?  I can’t quite figure it out.

Lately I’ve been noticing people passing out pity for things that don’t strike me as pity-worthy.  Take parenthood, for example.  I was at a birthday party for a little girl and ended up grazing at the food table alongside a woman I didn’t know.  “Which one of these is yours?” she asked, making a sweeping gesture towards the gaggle of kids running around in circles with no apparent purpose.

“Um…” I looked around and tried to focus on the whir of children.  “That one.  And… that one.”  I pointed to my two boys as they zipped by squealing with laughter.

“Oh. Two boys.  Wow,” she said.  “I’m sorry.”  And then she laughed a little.

I crinkled up my brow a bit.  “Don’t be.  I’m not.”

Turns out that she was the mom of a little girl, a little girl she adopted from China.  So clearly she chose her child.  I didn’t actually get to choose my boys, but honestly I wouldn’t have changed anything even if I could.  It’s not that I think things would have felt any less right if I had had a girl or two, it’s just that … well it seems pointless to spend any real amount of time even pursing that line of thinking, you know?  It is, as they say, what it is.

So what circumstances do merit pity?  Illnesses, I suppose, are pretty universally regarded as unfortunate.  And accidents. A run of bad luck.  But other things seem kind of subjective.  You want to be careful with saying things like, “Dude.  Sorry about that haircut,” because there’s every chance that homey likes that mullet that you just immediately assumed was a botched hair style.

I guess in general, I’m thinking of being a little more careful when doling out my sympathy to others.  Maybe, just maybe, others like the boxes they’re in, whether they chose to be in them or not.