Social apathy too often a byproduct of workaday blues

If you're like me, you wake up to the sound of a too-loud alarm clock at a too-early time and fumble clumsily for the snooze button. You toss back a steaming hot cup of whatever's brewing in the kitchen, blinking at the few family members who are for one reason or another awake at this ungodly hour.

You shower, change, and maybe eat a quick breakfast while staring blankly at the TV, watching an astonishingly chipper Katie Couric interview the latest Hollywood/DC/NYC "it" girl. Ten minutes later, you're in bumper-to-bumper traffic, swearing profusely at the idiot who just cut you off, flipping the radio dial in a futile attempt to find some decent music.

Like me, you park the car or jump off the bus and head into work, casting your eyes to the ground, looking up only to exchange tight, indifferent smiles with co-workers in the elevator before glancing up at the ceiling in an effort to avoid eye contact. You clock in, trudge to a cubicle or an office, kick off the too-tight work shoes, and get down to business, trying desperately to ignore the tiny voice in the back of your head which speaks of 80-degree weather, sunshine, lemonades and bright-blue pools.

And, if you're like me, the events of the morning probably don't cross your mind again. You don't think about how you didn't take the time for a five-minute conversation with your mom or husband or child. And, like me, probably don't think about how you carefully eased your automobile to a stop three inches from the one in front of you and pretended not to see the cars sitting in the right lane with their left blinkers flashing. You don't think about how you passed by the parking attendant without so much as a hello, how you didn't hold the door for the stranger walking in next to you, how you forgot to greet the security guard or failed to spare three seconds to talk with the woman who runs the office kitchen.

But maybe something happens, some random day -- you get paid an unexpected compliment, overhear someone's excited conversation with a friend, receive a long-distance phone call or a nice letter -- and you can't stop thinking about all those missed opportunities. You can't stop thinking about the fact that maybe you could have been the one to bring a smile to the face of a friend or a stranger, the idea that two seconds might have made a day's difference to one lonely passerby or worker. And you wonder what sort of person you have become, because how hard is it to smile or throw 10 cents in a tip jar or let someone else go in front• How hard is it to say, "I love you," to deliver a well-deserved compliment, to do something unexpected?

If you're like me: apparently, pathetically, pretty difficult. It's not that you don't care, it's more that you just don't think -- but looking back on it, you're not sure which is worse. At least if you didn't care, there would be a reason for not doing all those little things.

I'm guilty of not thinking, and to me that's a shame ... but it's something that can be changed, that must be changed. I see it in myself and in so many others. Long gone are the children who approached other neighborhood kids for games of pickup soccer or tag. Long gone are the little kids who drew pictures and painstakingly scripted: To Mom, Love Me. Back then, we acted out our love, our compassion and lust for life. We weren't preoccupied with the troubles of adulthood or work, and the problems that we did have seemed minor in comparison to the day's adventures.

If you're like me, you look at yourself in the mirror and think: Where is that kid• And maybe you think about your route to work tomorrow, how you're going to let in the red car that zoomed up and tried to beat everyone else. How you're going to stop and talk with the parking attendant. How you're going to ask your co-worker about her daughter's dance recital.

How, when you were little, all you wanted was to be Superman and change the world, only to grow up and keep missing your chance.

I'm going to start taking it.

Megan Bode, 19, of Upper St. Clair is a student at Duke University in North Carolina.

If you are a young person who has a passion for writing and stories and ideas you'd like to share, write Young Voices in care of Living, Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, D.L. Clark Building, 503 Martindale St., Pittsburgh, PA 15212, or e-mail tribliving@tribweb.com. Pieces should be no longer than 600 words. Don't forget to include your telephone number and address.