Spiritus Monday: Tough Love

Franciscan Father Richard Rohr, who is a national leader extolling the practice of contemplative prayer, sets out what I think to be a very telling and very demanding set of guidelines for personal conduct.

Rohr proposes 3 actions: “Refuse total allegiance (“idolatry”) to all false power, while still working around and with the power structure in service to justice and love; refuse to idealize one’s private self, which props itself up by myths of importance, control, power, money, and wealth; and, to offer ourselves trustfully to a much larger pattern, because our lives are not about us!” (emphasis Rohr’s).

I daresay to accept Rohr’s first edict in this world as we know it—and as far back historically as power has been exercised—would be to stand in the fire metaphorically and perhaps literally as well. Feel free to cherry-pick from the news those who wield power and send this idea off to them in a letter or email—or tweet.

The second notion begs a first step, an honest face-to-face with the face in the mirror—or if truly brave, let those closest to you do an intervention. A word of advice, brace yourself. Just in case. As a question, what if you lost _________ in the next instant? Game over for your you-ness? Life over?

Somehow this line of inquiry makes me recall the idea that the objects of our affections are not objects—are they?

Finally, there it is in a nutshell, “not about us”. We can’t have 7 billion “it’s-about-me’s” sucking the future out of this world. Just won’t work.

Reread Rohr’s ideas—read, contemplate, read again—demanding in extreme, I think, for most of us. Too demanding for many.

Now about those New Year’s resolutions….

Trump Names Arsonist New USFS Chief

Three-time convicted arsonist Edward “Bud” Franklin is slotted to reign as Chief for the US Forest Service in the Trump administration. Franklin, currently serving the 7^th year of a 10-year-sentence, resides at the federal prison camp located on the Maxwell Airforce Base in Montgomery, Alabama.

Sources within the presidential transition team explained Franklin will be pardoned by President Trump no later than Monday, January 23, 2017 and should be in his new office by the end of the week.

A transition official demanding anonymity revealed President-elect Trump believes Franklin would “shake things up” at one more “bloated federal agency”. The official went on to say that other nominees set to serve in the Trump administration thought the pick “inspired”, “transformational”, and “a good fit”.

Social media claims that Trump’s daughter Ivanka briefly dated Franklin while she was in college have been dismissed as “madman stuff—never happened—not her type” according to another unnamed official close to the Trump family.

Franklin, who is from Murfreesboro, TN, was graduated from high school in 1998 and earned a 2-year-certificate in welding. After being convicted and fined for starting small wilderness fires in Tennessee and Virginia, Franklin was sentenced in federal court for the 2009 Great Grassland Fire that burned over 12,000 acres in parts of Kansas and Nebraska.

A spokesman for the camp warden where Franklin is housed revealed the prisoner’s face “did seem to light up” when told of the appointment. The nominee was unavailable for a press conference because he is under house arrest for possession of smoking contraband.

The Sierra Club, the World Wildlife Federation, and the Audubon Society are on record protesting the nominee’s fitness for the post. An environmentalist, speaking anonymously, denounced the move as “waging a jihad against Mother Earth”.

In related market news, shares for heavy machinery manufacturer Caterpillar were up 1.8% today in light trading, and Chelyabinsk Tractor’s stock soared 6.2% on the Moscow Exchange. (FLNS)

Spiritus Monday: Radical Awe

Self-identifying as a child of God unscrolls several lines of thinking that are helpful to my sense of self and my connection to the larger world beyond the domain of my face in the mirror.

To view myself as a child—in the sense of a certain smallness physically and of a limited understanding cosmically—provides a good dollop of humility. Basically stated, I am so small and God’s creation is so vast—deeply humbling.

Of course, there is the longstanding idea setting God in place as a fatherly figure and the human race safely in the basket of all God’s children, but it’s a child’s response to the world that most resonates with me.

Most anyone who has been around preverbal children has seen their facial reactions to new experiences—birthday candles, puppy licking at their faces, a sudden boom or pop that startles them. They are unable to articulate through words what they are feeling, but clearly they are moved.

This ability to respond may encompass small children standing rapt before waves crashing onshore, geese splashing in a small pond, or a large adult looming before them. I venture to say they are in awe in the moment.

Surely, children in such circumstances may shout or shriek or gasp, which is not so very far from we adults, who in a moment fairly described as awestruck, may call up nothing more than a Wow from our more sophisticated vocabularies.

I have known many such moments. I hope you have as well.

Rightfully, now, you may be thinking back to the title of this little piece of my mind. Nothing so very radical in the idea of being so stunned by a scene or event before us that we are dumbstruck in wonder.

Well, should you be thinking of the deep blue of the Caribbean or the mighty chasm that is the Grand Canyon or the terrible solemnity of a funeral, I am with you. But I have in mind smaller items on this particular agenda.

Restudy your right or left hand, unfold a half-opened rose, or watch a young deer stumbling to its feet.

An AAA battery, a coffee grinder, or a daisy. A pencil and a piece of paper.

Imagine a point of view where all you behold amazes you as if you were a child just coming along into this world. How extraordinary, how enthralling, indeed how miraculous life would seem. To live in radical awe of all things. 

Worrywarts, Unite!

Is it time for Worriers Anonymous? May be a need, although most likely WA already exists. Let me check.

Of course it does. Here’s the link: http://www.worriersanonymous.org. My public service for the day, done.

This topic arises from what I thought a moderately interesting quotation yesterday morning, part of my daily routine to post a notion from the famous, living or, more likely, dead to us. Here’s the observation: “What worries you, masters you.” John Locke (1632-1704) I include the lifespan of the author as a way of reminding all of us that the more things change….

When more than a handful of friends, acquaintances, and strangers hit the like button, and even more so when a handful take the time to comment, my reader radar starts beeping.

Worry is not to be taken lightly, of course. Having evacuated your home under the threat of a Cat 2 hurricane that is slowly rolling toward your town is cause for concern rising to the level of worry—anxious moments, indeed, and anxiety for the reality of the situation and the potential outcome. All fairly and squarely fermenting in the worry barrel.

Turns out, I had 3 quotations addressing worry in my file of quotations that may or may not see the light of morning—well, I post typically at 6:00, so would be the darkness of the morning for most this time of year. I went with Locke because he offered a gentler nudge, a sort of Hey, be aware. And by extension, try to dial down on the worry meter.

I didn’t go with this line: “I define anxiety as experiencing failure in advance”. Seth Godin (1960--) Struck me as a bit too negative at a point in the day that might be pre-coffee or before yoga or after dressing the kids for school.

And I easily vetoed this one: “Worry is spiritual short sight…. Its cure is intelligent faith….” Paul Brunton (1998-1981) Just too early for what may be antagonizing or perhaps a springboard into philosophizing on the meaning of faith in a troubled time.

But worry about the potential for mayhem of some sort—that I think gets the goat of some folks worrying the moment. Being a captive of worst-case scenarios that seem to unleash the coconuts clacking in the mind. Pacing, knitted brows, restless sleep—or no sleep at all—and unable to wrest control back from the monkeys.

The ones in your mind. My Zen buddies or meditative types will know the allusion to the quest to quiet the monkeys in the mind. Metaphorically. I am just jacking the image up a notch by imagining the monkeys smacking coconuts together.

If the monkey imagery doesn’t resonate, go with Macbeth complaining of a mind full of scorpions. Metaphorically. True, he’s killed his king, and so the visual might be overkill for our day-to-day worries.

But if you do, in fact, conjure an image of monkeys crashing coconuts together and even add a song for them to be singing, perhaps your worries may subside a bit, and thus the exercise is therapeutic.

No charge, Worry Warriors.

Now, I must admit some of this coaching strays into the territory of two of my 

strongest dislikes. One, don’t tell me how I feel. Two, don’t tell me what to feel. Plainly, then, any positive takeaway does not in any fashion reflect the intent of the writer.

It’s all in your head. 

In a Word, Odious

Perhaps I am overly attuned to things Orwell, but lately an uptick in media references to the writer has me nodding sagely with the appropriate “Uh-huh” to no one in particular unless you count my dog, Max.

Never been a fan of super-then fill in whatever word you wish construction—just doesn’t resonate with me, and slides into the Orwellian realm of doubleplusungood. No, I prefer to use words that slice ideas and feelings into thinner slivers of meaning. Something like, oh, a word like odious.

Racism is odious.

Bigotry is odious.

War is odious.

Sexism and ageism. Odious and, odious.

Rape, odious.

Physical assault, odious.

Bullying, odious.

Shaming, odious.

Price gouging, odious.

Lying, odious.

Well, this listing could go on and on. Let’s, for the sake of the dreaded learning experience that is not so cleverly designed as a word game, do a mix and match. Come on, it will be fun.

Substitute a word that you think best matches for racism, bigotry, war, sexism, ageism, rape, physical assault, bully, shaming, price gouging, and lying.

Google gets at the sense of the word odious in pretty worthwhile fashion:  extremely unpleasant; repulsive, revolting, repellent, repugnant, disgusting,  offensive, objectionable, vile, foul, abhorrent, loathsome, nauseating, sickening,  hateful, detestable, execrable, abominable, monstrous, appalling, reprehensible,  deplorable, insufferable, intolerable, despicable, contemptible, unspeakable,  atrocious, awful, terrible, dreadful, frightful, obnoxious, unsavory, unpalatable,  unpleasant, disagreeable, nasty, noisome, distasteful; ghastly, horrid, gross;  godawful, beastly. Now, wasn’t that doubleplusfun? Super-fun? Exhilarating!

Re: The White House--An Open Letter to the President-elect

Dear President-elect Donald J. Trump,

Mr. Trump, I would like to urge you to reside full-time in the White House during your tenure as president. When you take the oath of office, you will no longer be citizen Trump, businessman Trump, Manhattanite Trump. You, Sir, will be highest ranking public servant in the United States. 

The White House is the public’s house for the person who holds the office of the presidency. Symbolically and practically, it is where you will conduct much of the public’s national business. As you know, the public, under your leadership, stretches from San Juan to Huntsville to Pueblo to Hilo.

That Americans come from across this nation to that building as tourists or in times of crisis sets the tenor for what the White House represents—the place where the president resides, the place where the president does the great work that needs to be done.

That historic building, which is more than its construction materials, gives weight to your decisions, and by the work you will do, you will give weight to the legacy of that national symbol. And so, Mr. Trump, only the White House is appropriate for your full-time home as you serve your fellow citizens during your term as president.

If I may add one more thought, on the day of your inauguration, about 10,000 babies will be born in the U.S. To take a moment for an obvious point, the newest citizens among us do not choose their family, their gender, their race, their socio-economic status, their geographic location, nor their president.

About half, maybe a bit more, will be considered part of the minority population in the U.S. They perhaps more than any other citizens, Sir, are in your care. May you keep all those children—all 10,000—in your heart and mind as you lead this country as its 45^th president. And those children who will follow each and every day.

Best wishes to you and your family as you undertake this task.

Sincerely,

Scott Kaple

Sorry, Not Sorry

Bad good-reader, bad Linkedin-er!

From time to time, I am reminded by friends and colleagues that I am a sorry practitioner on goodreads. I am perfectly willing to use the site to my advantage—checking out writers that I am unfamiliar with, sometimes borrowing quotations—but never do I contribute. Never.

My defense? I’m still talked out on books. The result from teaching high school English for 31 years. Yep, that’s the sum total of my excuse.

To my credit—and it’s not much—I have a number of times posted on Facebook that I keep a running list of books read since October 2009. Okay, more than once. Maybe fewer than 3 times. Just titles and authors, and cleverly an (F) if the work is fiction. No ratings, no commentary, no quotations.

Helpful, huh? Interested in the list? Curious about my tastes? Ask for it via the comments section for this post or send me a message via Facebook. Yes, I will cull the nonfiction titles for you if you prefer. Helpful, yes?

In a fit of guilt this past week, I did rate a few novels on Amazon. A minor fit. More of an impulse. Less than an urge. Just something I did in the moment.

Like now—last four novels read, with comments:

The Queue – Aziz: Egypt, dystopian, disheartening, shrewd

The Association of Small Bombs – Mahajan: India, terrorism, families, shrewd

The Sympathizer – Nguyen: Vietnam, double agents, violence, shrewd

Gould’s Book of Fish – Flanagan: Tasmania, wit, wisdom, shrewd

Beach reads? No. Good reads? Yes. By the way, I think the Flanagan novel a work of whimsical genius. And that can’t be a good sign for the other 99% of the population. My mother’s theory is simple: If I like it, it’s doomed, and when I don’t, it’s a winner.

Now as for being linked, or not, it does trouble me that of late the folks at Linkedin are asking via email if I know myself. Usually a list of someone I do know, someone I don’t know, and then there I am. Do I know myself? Oh, they really don’t want to go there with me.

And how is that someone that I am fairly certain I don’t know is touting my leadership skills? Like leading my dog on a leash during the daily walks? It’s an office of one here, People! Okay, and the dog.

As for connections, yikes! Some of these individuals have real jobs in real workplaces where people keep track of stuff like productivity, sales quotas, medicines, or cost overruns. Me? I’m just hanging out with a dog on a nice piece of property and doing some reading and less writing.

When I do help friends or family, usually I am driving a load of stuff to the dump, or working as unskilled labor, or moving a piece of furniture. The jobs that are sent from Linkedin to me based on my skillset are utterly fantastic as in no basis in reality. None. Nada. Zip. Zilch.

I run a limited media presence here at Camp Reflection. No, I don’t snap or chat. Yes, I use Facebook—mostly just pictures and chitter-chatter.

No need to read between the lines. Tag me among the reading unskilled. Happily so.

Spiritus Monday: Reading James

Someone dear to me swears by James—that is, the Book of James from The Bible The early verses passed along to me last week are followed by this passage from Chapter 1:

9 Let the brother of low degree rejoice in that he is exalted: 10 But the rich, in that he is made low: because as the flower of the grass he shall pass away. 11 For the sun is no sooner risen with a burning heat, but it withereth the grass, and the flower thereof falleth, and the grade of the fashion of it perisheth: so also shall the rich man fade away in his ways.

And, continuing the line of thought, in Chapter 2:

2 For if there come unto your assembly a man with a gold ring, in goodly apparel, and there come in also a poor man in vile raiment; 3 And ye have respect to him that weareth the gay clothing, and say unto him, Sit thou here in a good place; and say to the poor, Stand thou there, or sit here under my footstool: 4 Are ye not then partial in yourselves, and are become judges of evil thoughts?

To my mind, pointedly this writer offers in the same chapter a rather wry observation: 15 If a brother or sister is naked and destitute of daily food, 16 and one of you says to them, “Depart in peace, be warmed and filled,” but you do not give them the things which are needed for the body, what does it profit?

The language of James can turn ferocious, in a manner quite beyond the expression way harsh that was once in vogue:

5 Go to now, ye rich men, weep and howl for your miseries that shall come upon you. 2 Your riches are corrupted, and your garments are motheaten. 3 Your gold and silver is cankered; and the rust of them shall be a witness against you, and shall eat your flesh as it were fire. Ye have heaped treasure together for the last days. 4 Behold, the hire of the labourers who have reaped down your fields, which is of you kept back by fraud, crieth: and the cries of them which reaped are entered into the ears of the Lord of sabaoth.

Damning, scathing, virulent. But, despite the linguistic pyrotechnics, nothing really new to see here.

In the Judeo-Christian tradition reaching deep into history, we find an ongoing heightened awareness of suffering—even more, we hear recurring admonitions that those in great need are in our charge, demanding of us with more a compelling duty.

In the Old Testament, Isaiah counsels us to “Learn to do right. See that justice is done—help those who are oppressed, give orphans their rights, and defend widows”. (Isaiah 1:17)

From Zechariah, “…Execute true judgement, and shew mercy and compassions every man to his brother: 10 And oppress not the widow, the fatherless, the stranger, nor the poor; and let none of you imagine evil against his brother in your heart”. (Zechariah 7:9-10)

My readers are savvy enough to rescan in their minds the focus of headlines in our contemporary world: refugees, the impoverished, the homeless, victims of natural disasters.

I have no interest in wading into the waters roiled by contemporary political currents. Maybe, however, we at least may come together and agree to give what we can give, to do what we can do.

And so, good deeds, done.

You and Me

What follows is one of my favorite sections from Martin Buber’s I and Thou:

The Brahmana of the hundred paths relates that the gods and the demons were once engaged in a contest. Then the demons said: “To whom should we offer our sacrifices?” They placed all offerings in their own mouths. But the gods placed the offerings in one another’s mouth. Then Prajapati, the primal spirit, bestowed himself upon the gods.

For Buber—and I offer the idea broadly—the central shift that all individuals must make is to transform what he terms an I-It approach to others into the I-You so that we are joined together in this life we share rather than traveling as islands separate from the main.

To not only see the other, but to bond with the other in a way that validates, recognizes, honors one another beyond objectifying or idolizing. Spirit to spirit, if you will allow.

Getting at the idea from another angle, the philosopher Immanuel Kant proposed that rational human beings should be treated as an end in themselves and not as a means to something else. The very fact of our shared humanity is enough worth in itself. We are each of us a valued You, not merely a material It.

That we are one of more than 6 billion individuals, each someone who has not been before, will not again be a part of this earthly realm—well, to my way of thinking, a compelling reason to stand before each other in awe: You! No, You!

Several times over the years, I joked with friends and family that I hoped I would not drop dead over a stack of essays or tests that demanded grading. Wishing that my last vision would not be the pile of papers and thud!, my head down, eternally at rest.

Perhaps the image strikes you as morbid or grotesque or even perverse, or maybe amusing. Stay with me idea-wise. Since we do not know when our last breath may come, and since we do not know if someone may be there with us—friend, stranger, kin, clerk, judge, or helpmate—there and then, if ever were it to be so, a moment calls for I-You rather than I-It.

I have found—and this may seem like an aside—that to ask of folks at service centers or checkout counters, service technicians or assistants of some sort or another, how they are doing, how their day goes is often met by surprise. Anyone, really. I can hear the shift in their speaking tones. More often than not, I will see it in their demeanor. Buber’s I-You is at work. In both directions. No longer am I merely a work order, a shopper, a blood donor. No longer an It.

For a week, a day, chance the connection. Consider each encounter as the final moment in the passage. We may be all that we have.

Besides, we do know this idea to be true at its core. The only question is must we wait for earthquakes and floods and tornados and hurricanes.

May I then, finally, offer a gentle tweak. You-Me, Baby!

Spiritus Monday: Daily Prayers

Morning Prayer

In Your name I ask—

Please let me give love,

Please let me show compassion,

Please let me offer strength,

Please help me create peace.

Please bless my family and my friends.

Please bless those who are sick and those who are healing.

Please show mercy to those who suffer.

Please bless this home.

Please bless those most in need of blessing.

Amen.

Evening Prayer

In Your name, in gratitude—

Thank you for the blessings of this day.

Thank you for the blessings of this life.

Thank you for the blessings of this world.

Thank you for blessing my family and my friends.

Thank you for blessing those who are sick and those who are healing.

Thank you for showing mercy to those who suffer.

Thank you for blessing this home.

Thank you for blessing those most in need of blessing.

Amen.

A Thing about Things

There’s something about putting your hands on all the things you own and making the big decision: Keep or toss? Last week I made my 12th move in 31 years—no, none of a military nature—and somewhere, somehow, I tricked myself into thinking I had downsized along and along.

A little over a year ago I generated a bit of chatter about moving on geography-wise, and so I started eyeballing things around the house with a more critical eye. What if someone sneaked in and absconded with the beer can trophies from the Wednesday beer can races?

I couldn’t say. I can look at them and be reminded of 4 seasons of racing on my own boat. Do I need the cue, or are enough of the details, the stories, the misadventures anchored deeply enough in my memory bank?

They came with me.

Of course, I duly note my charitable giving: Who needs three outdoor vests? Kept one. Who needs 7 pairs of reading glasses? Okay, they were all too weak for what the eyes will have these days.

To the dump with two pickup truckloads of broken stuff, unwearable clothes, dulled drill bits, smashed blinds, broom sans straw, e.g., a stick. That last one was tough.

How many dishes do I need? Wait, thirty-one family members now live between 25 and 35 minutes from the new homestead.

Just 3 lamps to light my way. Hey, it’s just me. And the dog, Max. He’s not much of a reader.

A friend of mine around that same time I got twitchy last year tossed Marie Kondo’s tidying magic read onto my list. Told me it was life-altering. Well, I was sort of on the cusp of life-altering, so why not.

Marie lost me on the books. I heard her. I tried to internalize. Even went around mumbling “No one reading, just a doorstop. No one reading, just a doorstop”. Couldn’t do it. Cleverly cut the number of boxes for books this move from 42 to 36 by upsizing to 16x16x16s. Brutal weight to lift when stacking them 4-high. 

Pro movers this time around. No brainer.

Hey, this is 21^st century, even for me…two printers, two laptops, one mini-laptop, one tablet, a digital camera, and 4 extra flip phones to be donated. Soonish.

Tools. Check, check, check, check, check, check, check, check, check….

Small coffee pot, large coffee pot, crock pot, large George Foreman, outdoor gas grill, small Weber charcoal grill. Staff of life stuff right there.

Half-a-dozen scotch glasses. Hey, you never know.

Four pairs of reading glasses.

Two dozen neckties. And I’m retired for goodness' sake. Maybe a necktie bonfire. Eight pairs of jeans. That sounds about right. Are jeans and ties ever a thing? Never.

I may never have to buy socks again. As in never.

And the wall pictures. Good grief. I could open a gallery. A small one, true enough, but still.

But wait, the movers had me out in 90 minutes. Had me in in 70. Not so bad.

Oh, and I found as I was rifling through large mailing envelopes stuffed into the buffet drawers my Hurricane Hugo pictures. Actual photos, that you hold in your hand.

Need them to conjure up those memories? Nah, the scent of snapped pines is still burned in my nostrils. But, I’m keeping them.

No, I don’t have a storage unit. That’s why I have a garage. For the things, you know. No no, not those things. 

The other things.

A Question of Authority

Perhaps one of my favorite quotations of the sort that I post nearly each morning on Facebook begs a question. While I am no fan of standard multiple choice (guess) tests—why would I spend my time as a teacher creating a test element where 80% of my work was generating wrong answers—here we go.

Who said the following: Our prime purpose in this life is to help others. And if you can't help them, at least don't hurt them.

A.   My preteen niece

B.   Ibn Arabi

C.   Anne Frank

D.  St. Theresa of Calcutta

E.   The 14^th Dalai Lama

F.   Albert Schweitzer

G.  Desmond Tutu

H.  Rigoberta Menchu

I.    Your best friend

J.    None of the above

And the correct answer is….

Does it matter?

Oh, no! Not the answer a question with a question gambit.

Is that a problem for you?

A Nothing Morning

A routine morning, a routine day, a routine stretch at work, a routine rotation at a workout. Easy in the saddle. Even enough time to mull over routine vs ritual as the coffee is being made. But, life, you know. Life happens.

I get the concept of being present in the moment. Those of us who make our coffee in the morning have our routine, a range of motions, filling, measuring, grinding. Waiting. I set the knockoff Tervis in front of the coffeemaker and to the left. My mug of many years’ service—chip and a hairline crack near the rim—to the right.

I pour the hot coffee into my mug, half-full, half and half already added. Half-full, the pseudo-Tervis. Top off the mug, the remainder into the Tervis. If I choose to do so, I can listen to the splash of the coffee, feel the heat of the coffee pot, smell the coffee. And ignore the rest of the world in my mind, in the kitchen, and beyond—to infinity even.

Last week—about mid-morning and hours past waking up and smelling the coffee—a thrashing about in the front trees and a sound, a sound unlike anything I have ever heard. I was reading and so immediately looked up. 

Clearly birds in the two young elms, but I couldn’t see them in the leaves. And that sound, not a cat, not a scream, not a squirrel—but what?

From tree to tree in the thickest patches of green, mockingbirds. Two? Yes. But that sound, beyond distress—what? And in the mix a third bird, a crow. A tumultuous, flailing chase, through the limbs and leaves.

The crow rockets out toward the street with the mockingbirds in pursuit—and those cries, shrill and pained and not for a child’s ears. Horrible, truly.

Now I am standing at the window.

The crow dips toward the road because—because the chick fell from its beak. A mockingbird chick. Mostly likely from the nest in the spruce near the end of the driveway. The crow pecks at its lifeless body, the adult mockingbirds flutter overhead, land and try to dash in and retrieve the younger bird.

Fending them off with flapping wings, the crow grabs the chick and manages to fly up maybe 15’ or so off the ground, and again the prize falls to the street. The parents—I must assume—are wheeling about in a frenzy, diving at the crow.

There can be no intervention.

The crow covers its target and takes pecks from the mockingbirds. Finally they relent, and in that respite the crow latches on to the dead and flies off with the mockingbirds trailing, soon beyond my range of sight.

Calm reasserts itself. Just like that. Time to pay a few bills before the mail carrier rolls through. And my mid-morning snack.

Of Strangers

I suspected in my mind at least a 45-minute+ drive in the offing to the county seat, picture i.d. in hand and my checkbook. Needed some paperwork and couldn’t find it when sifting through my files and then the county’s online site.

But before getting in the truck, I called the county records department. Just past 9:00. The woman who answered—and I didn’t get her name, unfortunately—had the voice: professionally courteous. I explained what I hoped to find, my version of a golden ticket. Her reply: That doesn’t get filed with us.

So, I went for the second-best, some information that could be the first step on a trail of detective work that could lead, maybe, to what I needed information-wise. Wait, she said. And so silently she worked through screens of pages from closing documents. Nothing yet, she said. I waited.

Got it—she seemed pleased. An attorney’s name because one page of dozens had been stamped. And a phone number. Maybe 9:10 or so, as I recall.

I phoned the law office. Again, greeted professionally and courteously, and I offered up my need. A few questions, a short silence, and a simple proclamation: We have it, but we can’t release it to you.

What if? I asked. Karen paused: Hold on a minute, please.

After a few minutes, the next voice I heard was that of a senior partner. I explained, he asked some questions. I waited as he looked over the files. He requested some information be faxed to him, and he offered to have the item I need scanned and emailed to me.

Off to a local shipping/post/fax/etc business I went and the documents were on the way—9:30. I drove home, took a shower, shaved, and then by and by checked my email. Voila! Got it, and I emailed the document to where it needed to get to. At 10:20.

Just three people. Three strangers doing their jobs, showing consideration, solving a small problem in a world of catastrophes, but an important hurdle cleared for me.

The way the world really works so much of the time—people getting stuff done for other people, even when no immediate monetary reward is on the table. And though it a bit cliché to note, not the stuff of the 24/7 news cycle.

What else do we have, though. To be embroiled in the rage of the world? No, no thank you. Let me revel a bit in the sanctity of small human kindnesses. Just for a morning, at least.

By the way, I thought the title for this post would be The Kindness of Strangers, but I changed my mind knowing some readers would have a very specific scene come into their heads and could not unread it.

And now, they can’t.

Spiritus Monday: A Chain of Beings

For my brethren and companions' sakes, I will now say, Peace be within thee." Psalm 122:8

You have seen it happen, how many times?

The holding open of a door in a public space--a chain of action and reaction--paid forward, paid backward, paid sideways. With a shoulder, a knee, a heel, an elbow.

Sometimes almost comically. One after another after another after another. And spin some children into the mix and high hilarity ensues.

The door has been held for you in the past and will be held for you in the future. You have most likely done the same for others in your past, and you will most likely do so again.

Is there ever anyone that you would let the door close upon?

Of course, the physical differences are easily noted. By gender, by age, skin color, by body type.

But what of their hearts, these strangers. Do they bear the heart of a worried parent or a grieving child? Do they love deeply or are they afloat in apathy?

Do you know for certain their minds? Their spiritual practices? Their political views? Their personal ethics? Their work ethic?

Does a headscarf dissuade you? A tatoo? A Star of David? A scar across the cheek? A cross? Baggy pants? Uniform? College emblem?

This chain of all beings, linked. Right?