Nobody Is Home

Start playing around and see what happens.

Kids will do many things for the sole purpose of finding out whether anyone is home. I don’t mean whether anyone else is in the house. I’m talking about whether anyone is really in the home.

If the children realize that nobody is home, if they can’t manage to even get someone pissed off at them—because anger would be better than indifference—they are not energized and excited, as one might expect. They don’t start planning Ferris Bueller’s next big day off. Rather, something different happens. If the feeling of being in an empty home continues, they become demoralized.

We want people to care. When we see that they don't—if we can’t even cry out and get them to notice—then the salt water of nihilism comes rushing into our mouths. We want to live and work in a house where everything matters.

But this is not an essay about raising children. I’m referring to you and I and the increasing sense that we live in a world where, on many days and maybe even on most days, nobody actually seems to be home.