Goodbye Harold. Thanks for taking me along on your journey.

I just finished a book.  I'm so excited to have finished it!  I love that sense of accomplishment that comes with turning that final page and closing the cover.  Almost as quickly as that feeling of triumph came, I am overwhelmed by the melancholy of saying goodbye to the friends whose daily lives, in fact their very thoughts and feelings, I have been so involved in while reading their story.  Most of these people are not real.  I rarely read nonfiction -- although I have truly loved the biographies and autobiographies I have read.  They become so real to me as I read.  I can see them.  I can feel what they have felt.  I have been to so many wonderful places with them.  Sometimes they become so much a part of my life that I forget they do not exist outside of the pages.  I become so accustomed to them being part of my life that they never really leave me.  I often find myself wondering what they are doing now before I remember they were just characters in a novel.  I can't bring them back by rereading them, either, for when I do, it is just remembering something that I already went through with them.  I want to know what came next.  I want to know what Jem and Scout did when they grew up. (To Kill a Mocking Bird by Harper Lee) I want to know what happened with Judy and Master Jervie.  Did they have children?  Did they stay in love? (Daddy-Long-Legs by Jean Webster)  I want to know what Jo's grandchildren thought of her stories.  (Little Women by Louisa May Alcott)  Even reading a sequel is not enough.  It still doesn't tell me what happened after that and I miss them.  It's like moving away and losing touch with an old friend.  And yet, the only thing left to do is pick up a new book and make a new friend.  So, goodbye Harold and Maureen (The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry by Rachel Joyce) and hello my next dear friends!

Calgon, take me away!

     Oh, please make it stop!  Please, make the voice go away!  No, I'm not talking about a voice in my head.  It's that one voice that is in every room I go into.  I swear it is following me.  Oh, wait!  It is following me.  I cannot even get away from it in the bathroom.  It stands right outside the door and continues with the mind-numbing chatter.  Okay, I probably shouldn't call My Swimmer "it", but my mind is going numb.  She has been babbling on for an hour and a half now.   I am not kidding!  All I have said is, "hmm", "oh", "uh-huh".  It doesn't matter if I leave the room she just keeps following me!  I'm not sure how she can just keep talking.  If it was anything worth listening to, I wouldn't mind so much.  I just can't handle the, "and then so-and-so said . . . and then I said . . . so then whatsherbucket said . . . and then we went to . . . and then we went to . . . and we saw whoosie-whatsit . . . and then . . ."  It's like reading the most poorly written book ever.  It just goes on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on without any punctuation!  Please, someone throw her a comma!!!!
     Oh, wow!  Bliss! My joy was full at that most beautiful of all beautiful poetry.  I am ecstatic over the one simple phrase, "Okay, I think I'm really going to bed now."  Just when I was on the verge of saying something besides "hmm," "oh," and "uh-huh"; something I would probably regret like "the S word",  Yes, I was actually on the verge of saying, "Shut up!"  But now, I don't have to say it.  What a tender mercy!  Silence you are my favorite companion!  Oh happy day!  I feel like breaking into the Hallelujah Chorus.  (Speaking of the Hallelujah Chorus, have you seen this?  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZCFCeJTEzNU&noredirect=1  I love this!  I had to go watch it again just now.
     I know that I should be grateful because when she's talking to me I know My Swimmer is not making major bad choices.  When she doesn't talk to me she's usually done something pretty bad and she's mad at me for it.  (It doesn't make sense to me either.)  Then the silence is not so golden.  So her talking to me is a really good thing, but for an hour and a half?  Seriously?  I guess I'll just look forward to the day when my partial hearing loss is no longer partial!  Dad, I envy your ability to turn off your hearing aid and shut out the noise!

The Blessing of a Homeless Man

Maybe it was because of the blue sky or maybe it was because I had just finished a strenuous workout in my water aerobics class or maybe it was just because I was feeling so blessed.  Whatever the reason when the homeless man said, "God bless you," to me I was brought to tears.  I'm not talking about a tear drop.  I mean it was to the point that I thought about pulling over to get myself under control so I could see to drive again.

I was driving to the office supply store in search of a very elusive desk top calendar (which they didn't have either.)  As I pulled off the freeway and came to the light at the underpass, there was a man standing there with a very faded sign.  I couldn't read it.  I was in the farthest away lane from him, several cars back.  I knew I had a dollar in the deep nether reaches of my purse.  My first thought was, "I'll never find the dollar by the time the light changes and he'll have to cross a couple of lanes of traffic to get it anyway."  Then King Benjamin's teaching flooded into my mind.  ". . . and ye will not suffer that the beggar putteth up his petition to you in vain . . ."  So I quickly started digging through my purse for that ragged old dollar I knew I had seen several days ago.  I found it and rolled down my window.  The man hurried over to the car and I gave it to him.  That was when he said, "God bless you."  My voice caught in my throat and I hoarsely whispered, "Thank you.  Good luck to you."  The light changed and I drove away amid a flood of tears.

I pulled into the parking lot of the office supply store, blew my nose and wiped my eyes and ran my errand.  Then I climbed back into the car and headed for the party store to buy rubber duckies and kazoos.  (Did you know that this month contains holidays celebrating both of those items?  So I picked some up to mail to My Scholar, whose name should probably be changed to My Missionary, and to My Princess, who now lives a whole hour away from me, and to help us celebrate the holidays.  P.S. National Rubber Ducky Day is January 13 and National Kazoo Day is January 28.)  As I was parking, I saw another homeless man standing on the curb near a parking lot exit (not the one I came in) holding a sign.  His back was to me so I couldn't see his sign either.  Once again my first thought wasn't exactly charitable.  I thought, "I already gave to a homeless person today.  When I leave the parking lot, I'll just go out the way I came in.  That way he will never have 'put his petition to' me and I won't have to feel bad about it."  I am so embarrassed that I even had those thoughts.  I can hardly believe I've decided to publicly share them.  I went into the store, forgot about the man, purchased my duckies and kazoos, and in the process discovered another dollar hidden away in my wallet -- why can't I ever find money when I am the one in need?  As I came out of the store I didn't even look in the homeless man's direction, but I couldn't help seeing him as I climbed into the car because the car was facing him.  (I was driving Bubba the Big Blue Bus today and nothing is tall enough to obstruct the view from the drivers seat except actual buses and semi trucks.)  I watched for a minute before starting the car.  He tried to get the attention of many a driver only to be ignored by everyone who passed.  I decided that I couldn't follow through with my plan.  I pulled the dollar out of my wallet grabbed an orange out of my shopping bags (I wish I had remembered the oranges with the first man.) and drove to the parking lot exit.  I rolled down my window and gave my offering and once again I heard the words, "God bless you."  All I could think as I drove away from him was, "He already has."  Then my mind was filled with the words of a familiar hymn.

. . . Because I have been sheltered, fed by thy good care,  I cannot see another's lack and I not share . . .

I was overwhelmed with a desire to gather up all the homeless people who I could fit into my big blue bus and take them home and feed them.  Anxiety and common sense took over at that point and I didn't follow through with the thought.  I wish we lived in a world where it would be completely safe for me to do just that.  Where I could take hungry, downtrodden people and make them a bowl of soup and warm them up on a cold, wintry day like today without worrying about my own safety or the safety of my home and family.

So here are the two things I took away from today's experience:

1. I have been so very blessed!  And
2. Buying rubber duckies will brighten any day.