How Ironic

As much as I’m on the road, and as often as I drive on dusty roads, or muddy, (however infrequent that is this year, my truck picks up grime.

And, since one of our company goals is to present a clean-cut, professional image, I am tasked with washing my truck just as frequently as it picks up grime.

And do you know what? 

It’s actually cheaper to run it through a carwash in town than it is to charge the business my time to wash it by hand. 

I still wash it by hand for old times sake once in a while, though.

I’ve long since stopped haggling with the carwash attendants about what is in the back of my bed. 

Once, they wanted me to consider removing a chain from the bed as it might fly out under the high-pressure rays of water.  I chuckled about that one all the way through the wash.

So, before I even get close to the wash, I stow everything that might easily fly out of the bed inside my cab and remove the receiver hitch.

I know the drill, Please place your car in neutral, and I know not to drive into the wash at anything more than a crawl.

And now here is where the weird part comes in.

I guess with as keyed up as I get, trying to keep the guys all running in an efficient way, this little expedition of 2 minutes is my destress time.

In fact, I’ll go so far as to say I’m almost hypnotized into a bit of a stupor where my head drops and my chin lands on my chest and I’m mostly out until I hear, far away, the jet sound of the blow dryer at the end. 

I’ve even thought of recording that whole journey of sound and playing it as my sleep sound when I’m still awake at 2 in the morning.

And so, on a day no different than many others, I had started down the wash tunnel, head sagging, eyes glazed when I was rudely, and quite suddenly brought around to wide awake reality.

My head literally snapped forward and then whipped backwards all in the space of a millisecond.

And, you know how it is in those situations, it’s like you hear the details of all the sounds leading up to the event just a bit after what actually happened.

What I heard, afterwards, were shouts and hollers and then a really loud bang, all before my awakening.

I had been rear ended, right in there and of all places, in a car wash. 

I looked around and realized I was about halfway down the track, and all motion of the brushes and water had ceased.

A wash attendant approached my window and gestured to roll it down.

When I did, he asked if I was alright, to which I replied that I thought I was.

He asked again, even more concernedly, if I was okay, and I told him other than being a little bit jostled, I was okay, (although I know there are some of you that might contest that statement of mine even on a good day.)

He informed me that a lady had entered the carwash at a higher-than-normal rate of speed and had never shut it down, even when they hollered.  In fact, it seemed she had accelerated.

He told me he would start the wash and when I was through, I should wait outside for the lady and we could inspect the damage done.  He was going to have her back out rather than continue the wash.

I told him I’d be in the first parking spot of the vacuums, and she could meet me there.

Well, I vacuumed, and as I did, I kept an eye out to see when the damsel in distress would be headed my way.

But no damsel did.

I saw a couple of cars drive out, one white, and the other another color that I can’t remember right now.

After a few minutes the attendant came out to where I was still vacuuming and asked if the lady and I had made arrangements yet.

I said no, no one had stopped by.

“No way,” he said.  “That means she up and left!”

“I guess so,” I replied.

And then, he got this funny look in his eyes.

“We get to know these cars and the people in them if they are regulars,” he said.  “I know exactly who she is.  She works for the insurance firm 2 blocks west of here.”

He said he guessed we should drive over there and that she parked her white car right in front where we couldn’t miss it.

Except there was no white car there.

“Go Muscles”

I am sitting in a coffee shop, writing a diverse thesis on my life when I see her come around the corner of the bar, clamber up on the tall bar chair that was almost double her height and settle in. 

She looks around 4 years old, but I’m not good with ages, so I don’t know. 

She seems comfortable there, and I see that her eyes follow something or someone straightaway from her.

Soon, she slides up on the bar with her upper body and I see the bar chair tip precariously away from her.  I get ready to make a rush for it if the chair does, indeed tip, leaving her high and dry and overbalanced in way that she and the floor will have a meeting sooner rather than later.

But she steadies herself in that graceful way any woman is capable of, and, as her chair tips back to level, she cups her chin in her hands and gazes in what seems to me, rapt attention, even adoration, of someone. 

And then I see who that someone is.

It’s her older sister.

And her sister is one of the baristas. 

Her big sister meets her across the bar, in much the same way her little sister is, halfway down on the bar, chin cupped in her hands.

They gaze into each other’s eyes, and smile at each other.

Her older sister asks her if she is going to cut up the onions and peppers that need to be cut up for her evening plans.

Little sister giggles and says, “No way!”

About then, I see their mother round the same corner of the bar that the little girl had earlier and, hearing the conversation about the onions and peppers, says, as she affectionately jiggles the little girl, “No, you can cut them up, we need to get you home so you can get some snoozy woozies.”

Mom offers to cut the onions and peppers up for big sister but there is no need.  Big sister has it handled.

Attention waning as the conversation turns older than her, little sister runs to the door to let herself outside to the beautiful spring day.

But she can’t quite do it.  The door is a bit heavier than her, and they bump each other around for a bit.

Her big sister sees and calls out encouragingly, “Go muscles!”

And with that bit of encouragement, the little girl gets the door open and lets herself and  her carefree laughter outside as the door tingles merrily shut behind her. 

Mom and big sister quietly finish up their conversation and Mom turns to leave.

Big sister turns back to her work.

I turn deeply inward, because, as I said in the beginning, I was writing a thesis on my life.

But it is no longer a thesis.

Rather, it is the scene that I have just written about that seems to give every appearance of kindness and camaraderie.

In Review

It’s been quite the year. 

We have migrated our business into our new digs on the corner of main and Hwy 56.

But we weren’t quite done with the remodel, so, in the process of everyday work and inventory draw, some of us were still trying to get things finished up.

There have been a few misunderstandings along the way, but nothing too major that it couldn’t be talked out and resolved.

There have been triumphs; we’ve developed our own spreadsheets to accurately bid jobs in a fraction of the time that we used to.

We have formulated teams that are strong and well orchestrated.

We’ve hired new employees, and, in what seems a stroke of good luck, we were blessed with exceptional guys to onboard with us.

One of our part time guys left to farm for the summer, which is understandable, but the hole he left is still felt.

And so now, I find myself in one of my favorite coffee shops in Dodge City, with my little computer in front of me, doing something that almost feels foreign to me.  And it must be somewhat foreign, because my spell check keeps popping up with spelling corrections that it didn’t used to pop up with.

I am writing again. 

And I hope it stays with me like it has for the last 3 to 4 years. 

But neither do I want to force it.

I wonder what you like to read?

I know what I like to.  I like to read about the normal everyday things other people do; seems like a person can learn so much from little things, and the normalcy of someone else’s life always does something to ground a person. 

At least if that person is normal, which I’m not sure if I am or not.

I’m pretty much out of cattle stories; just yesterday ole Katie, the beloved feed truck left for good.

And I have only 10 to 15 posts and fence rails to take down out in the old corral and then there will be no trace left of those years and the several thousand head of calves that moved through the place.

Other than abundant green kosha weeds, that is.

I have a few electrical stories.

And there are a few things I’d like to write about business values.

But, other than that, I guess you may just read about our normal daily routines.

I’m looking forward to this.

At Wayfinder

I am sitting in the sun at Wayfinder coffee shop in Colorado Springs. (If you are ever in the area, be sure to stop by). My affogato has been awesome down to the last little bit I was able to scrap out of the bottom of the cup.

Across the way from me are two young ladies. I guess them to be sisters. They visit off and on with each other.

I notice that every once in a while, one of the sisters gets a far away look in her eyes, her face gets sad looking, and her eyes get red. At first I’m not sure I am seeing correctly, but when I see it several times I am sure.

She is just barely holding back the tears. I wish there would be a way I could help her, but I realize it wouldn’t be my place, and each time she looks sad, she talks some with her sister, so I figure she is getting the help she needs for the time being.

The other young woman is holding her baby.

I’m a sucker when it comes to babies and little humans. And so, I watch their little one off and on. It is well behaved, and it is only when it gets tired that it whimpers a little.

The mother puts it in the stroller and pushes the stroller back and forth, but it looks like the little one isn’t having it, and so they start packing up to leave.

One of the sisters, the one who looked sad off and on, looks at me and nods with a smile. I haven’t seen this gesture on a woman before, that is, the nod and the smile together, and it piques my interest a bit.

They come even with me on their way out and I stand to talk with their little one. I lean over to pat his fat little cheeks and ask the mother how old he is. Her eyebrows scrunch up together and she shakes her head slightly.

“No understand,” she says. “No speak English.”

“Oh,” I say, and then I take another language barrier risk.

“Where are you from?” I ask.

She understands and says, “Ukraine.”

“I’m glad you are in our country,” I say. “Welcome here.”

Her face lights with joy, and somehow I think she got what I said.

Since then, my mind has gone hither and yon thinking about those women.

And so, here I step out on a branch that might break under me.

I know there are those who are upset at all the illegal immigrants who are in this country. And, probably, it would be nice if they could become legalized before they came here.

But as I thought of those ladies, and the obvious sorrow they carried, it didn’t take very much thinking to arrive at the reason why they might be sad.

And I realized that reason was so much of a heavier burden to carry than anything I have had to carry.

Is it asking too much, then, to realize that I somehow escaped what they have gone through and since I have escaped it, I am in a position show them kindness?

Let’s leave those immigrants who are here for the wrong reasons to the powers that be, and concentrate on looking for those who carry a heavier burden then we do because of the horrors they have left behind.

It’s these that deserve our kindness and, as much as we can understand, our empathy.

Old Barns and Old Men

I’m friends with Vernon Buller.

Well, maybe that needs qualifying. 

Vernon is my go-to friend when it comes to the art of drawing anything and everything.

Obviously the same couldn’t be said for him, because I have nothing to offer him in the shape of helping him draw better. 

The other evening, I got out of my car and walked myself into Vernon’s place.

As far as I know, I have never been in their house, but no matter.  I felt comfortable there the minute I walked in.

Vernon is 88 years old; I am 48.  Makes a nice age gap where a person can learn a lot from folks like him if they are of a mind too.

So, we sat hunched over at his kitchen table.  I sat as close as I could to him and watched as he showed me how to sketch in the first details of a picture and then how to add the finishing touches that make it come alive in 3D proportions. 

And after an hour and a half of this, we pushed back from the table, and I felt raring to go on some of my own stuff and just as much on the picture I had sent him earlier that I wanted some help on getting started.

But that’s not all.

Being with Vernon made me realize something else that has been niggling at the edge of my mind for the last while.

You see, it’s like this.

I’m a little weird this way, but I think something is happening in this area that only those of my generation and upwards are aware of.

There is a whole era that is slipping away from us right before our very eyes.

It involves the old barns and old men in our community.

I think I drive by one or several of these old barns almost every day.

And every day, I realize these old barns are slowly falling in on themselves.

But they aren’t falling in without a struggle, that’s for sure. 

Because they have been built with quality material, and built stronger than they needed to be, in a time that called for quality, not quantity, like the squeaky tight margins that today’s buildings are built. 

It’s amazing, to realize when you walk up close to these old structures, that every lasting board was cut by hand, fitted and nailed into place by hand, and as the barn grew in height, each board had to be handed up to someone who had gotten themselves up there, high in the air, by ladder and scaffolding, and not with some telehandler or manlift.

You could say each of these barns have been built with brute manpower and ingenuity, and I think that is why these old barns still stand the test of time.

And, you could say any one of these old men in our community come from the same mold as these old barns.

My friend Vernon is just one such man. 

There’s a man who drives a red Chevy pickup; I don’t know his name, but every day I see him parked at the local assisted senior living place.  This last summer I saw him take his wife out almost every day to the garden in the back and sit with her under the shelter, hand on her hand, each sharing the years that have built up on them, knowing, more than likely, that those years are coming to an end.

His kind of dedication isn’t seen as much anymore.  It’s the kind of dedication that has been built with the same value as those old barns and it looks like it holds true, easily, to the original framework it was built on.

A lot of these old barns are pushing the their timelines out in measure much the same as these older men are pushing their timelines out.

And I’m afraid certain values will fall off the end of their timelines, just as surely as they come to the end of their lifespans.

So, even though it probably doesn’t make sense to anyone else, I like to draw these old barns.  (I couldn’t be forgiven enough if I tried to draw the men, that’s for sure.)

Even if it is only for myself that I am drawing them.

Which is one of the first tidbits of wisdom Vernon gave me the other evening.

“Do what you are doing for you, not because of pressure from someone else.”

Another bit of wisdom—Always finish what you’ve started.  Even if it seems like an abject failure, if you keep at it, you’ll almost always be amazed at what it turns out to be in the end.”

And the last piece that he left me with, as he took the sketch he had been working on and held it inches from his face, shook his head and then held it out at arm’s length—”Always take a look at it from a ways back; it looks different there and gives you way more to work with than when you are looking at it close up.”

And if I ere not, every one one of these old barns were built on those same tenants, which of course, include most likely and quite literally, blood, sweat, and tears.

Thanks Vernon. 

I’m looking forward to the next evening I can spend with you hunched over your dining room table.

Sam

I first came in contact with him when I was 10 or 11 years old.

He was the salesman at Schmidt Sales.

We visited there a fair bit since my dad had an Alllis Chalmers tractor and Gleaner combine. Schmidt Sales sold and serviced both of them.

To be honest, he spooked me a little.

And yet, looking back on it today, I’m really not sure why.

Today I know him as a kind, jolly fellow who tries to make sure you don’t get one over him.

After Schmidt Sales, he dropped out of my life for the next 15-20 years.

The next time he entered my life was when I was a mechanic at the local John Deere.

He was a heavy smoker.

The front office didn’t think he should be smoking up there so he came to the back and smoked there.

For some reason I didn’t mind the smell and smoke from his cigarettes.

And, as often as not, he ended up getting a sales call just as he had taken his first drag on his newly lit smoke.

He’d stuff it in the ash tray close at hand and head back to the front to make his sales deal.

One of those almost new cigarettes got him in trouble once.

We had this exhaust takeaway system in the form of long 6 inch flexible tubes that we put over the tractors exhaust stack when we started them to take the exhaust away.

One of the mechanics brought in some newly fallen snow one day and formed it into a mini snowman that looked surprisingly much like him.

Next he put a red rag around the snowman’s neck and one of those hardly smoked ciggy’s in the snowman’s mouth. Finally, he lit the cigarette, put the exhaust tube just about the snowman’s head, turned on the fan to pull the smoke away and called him back there.

He was so disconcerted when he saw it that he pulled a new smoke out then and there, proceeded to put it into his mouth backwards and tried to light the wrong end.

Another time, while he was talking to us guys, with a lit cigarette in his left hand, lighted end to the back, one of us snuck behind him and doused it out with a squirt bottle we all had on hand to check for leaks in radiators.

His wrath showed through just a bit when he took a drag on that sodden thing.

I learned to like his visits back to take a smoke.

I don’t call myself a journalist in any stretch, but I did my own kind of subtle interviews with him, just because then, as today, I enjoy getting to know what makes people tick.

I learned he came from a farm family and his dad smoked and they had once threaded a horses tail hair down the center off his dad’s cigarette. Seems his dad was about as amused as he had been when we put his smoke out when he took his first drag on it.

Another time he said they put some sort of fire cracker in his dads cigarette about halfway down so that when his dad took a pull and it hit that firecracker, it all blew up in his dad’s face.

Seeing this side of him, I began to understand the way he continually jibed the people he was around.

I learned he was as Vietnam war vet.

I listened with sadness as I heard about a nine year old kid over there who had blown off half of his buddy’s lower body while he was riding together with him in the truck.

I also listened with amazement as he told of the reception he received when he finally made it home after that terrible time in his life over there.

Seems the home folks disgust of what the government was doing in Vietnam got blasted on to the soldiers as they stepped off the plane here in the U. S. of A.

I knew he got lucky more than not, so when he offered to go with a $20 on each of us picking which way a coin would land, I refused.

I knew he’d win. Plus I didn’t bet anyway.

His life experiences must have endowed him with the ability to see beyond the surface and to know what was being said without words.

He must have seen what I needed, even though I didn’t know I needed it at the time.

He had heard I had put a sprinkler system in my own yard, and it wasn’t but a month later that he told me one of his friends was looking for someone to put a system in his yard.

He wondered if I would ‘put a system in for his friend.’

And that got us started in a twenty year occupation that put groceries on the table and clothes on our children when my normal job didn’t quite stretch around.

It was terribly hard work. I’d clock out at John Deere, and go install sprinklers until 11:30 or 12 at night.

It was like I worked two days in one, with the second day being far more physically demanding than the first.

I know for a fact he knew how hard of work it was, and I felt his support each time I showed up, on time and ready to put in a full day’s work for my John Deere boss the next morning.

Another time he asked me to close in a bathroom he had framed up in his shed.

My family helped me with that, and I was mortified, come around 10:30 that evening, that I hadn’t figured my plywood right and the last piece I needed fit in place would have the grain going the wrong way from all the rest.

He told me to put it up anyways, he’d paint it so no one would know.

He thought I could weld decently, so when he and Bill got into restoring Cushman motorcycles, he brought them back for me to fill in the holes on the fenders so that they could be painted and no one would know there had been a hole there.

Another time, one of the sales guys had traded for a tractor with a scoop on it. The scoop frame was spung, resulting in the bucket hanging listlessly down on one side. He brought it back and somehow gave me the confidence that I could get it fixed.

And, I guess because of that confidence, I found a way to get it fixed.

He always told me I could stop in at his little shop here in town to use his tools or the welding table if I needed, and I took him up on it a time or two.

To me, he epitomizes what community is all about.

If what another man once told me is true, that when we finally get to the end of our life we are 80% of what others of have made us and 20% of what we have made ourselves, then I reckon he figures in to a large part of that 80%.

Thanks Sam Wehkamp.

But let’s be clear, I don’t owe you anything.

7:30 a.m. Transit

I’ve never been an early riser.

For that matter, I’m never really late to bed.

Does that mean I’m lazy?

Ever since we moved our electrical business to town, I’ve pulled my creaky bones out of bed a fair bit earlier than I am wont to.

The boys engineered this idea. 

They said we should all get to the office at 7:30, hang around, make a coffee or an espresso, talk about the day and jobs ahead, and then come 8 everyone could move in their several directions.

(Which most likely is the toilet, after all the heavy cup-a-joe intake.)

I admit, I like the routine.

Most times I sit back in my office, listening in on the banter and all going on.

Occasionally, I don’t sit as easy, because trouble is brewing, and a solution needs to be arrived at.

But there is something else that I’m quite sure pulls it all together for me.

It’s the drive to town.

It’s a different crowd that drives to work at 7:30 in the morning.

I saw that the first day I drove the road at that time.

Folks aren’t so rushed; almost everyone is going at their own pace, and I think it’s because very few of us need to actually clock in until 8.

For years, I drove to work around the 7:57 time.  Way too close to cut it, and that always showed up in the way I drove and met people.

I wonder how many folks had stars in their windshields after I passed them?

I know I got a few pitted windshields myself; I suppose in return for the way I drove during those years.

On one of those early morning drives, I noticed two things, that almost stunned me.

I put it off as a one-time deal, but it isn’t.  It’s been happening right along, every morning there is school.

I saw a little girl, I think?  It’s too dark to tell, walking out to the school bus.

And I saw her mother walking out there with her.

I said to myself it must be a one-time thing and that when the weather gets really cold, she won’t do it anymore.

But I was wrong. 

Every morning, cold weather or not, Mom and the little girl walk out, loaded down with school paraphilia.

And I see that mom walks close beside her little charge to the bus and then makes sure her little precious is safely loaded on that big school bus. 

And once she is safely on board, I see Mom run back to the house, because she didn’t grab her coat. 

Seeing her dedication makes me realize I didn’t always have the same level of care and commitment for my children.   

The second is the school bus driver.

Admittedly, this year has been a bad one for the county to try to keep our roads in shape.

There are some real trouble spots that could turn an out-of-towner back in the direction from which they came in a lick of a second.

But those of us home folks know about those spots, and we know how to get past them, or through them, without too much commotion.

The school bus driver knows about those spots also.

Even though he has a lot more miles to cover and a lot more bad spots in the road to remember than the rest of us.

I see him, each morning, slowly pull out of the driveway from the house where Mom walks out to his bus with her daughter,

I see him pull completely over to the wrong side of the road for a while, taking it slow, and then I see him angle back, at just the right place so that the big bus doesn’t hit too many washboards, to the other side of the road.

It takes him a few more slow shifts from this side to the other side of the road, because it seems that he also knows his cargo isn’t of your regular type, before he reaches the black top and speeds up.

I have a lot of respect for that school bus driver.

Probably about the same as I do for the mom, who is warming herself back up inside.

Both of them seem to have their priorities right; both know what is valuable and aren’t above taking the extra pains to make sure everyone and everything is okay.

It’s worth the 7:30 a.m. transit in this small community.

Would you ever, and, I feel like

Recently I was at a business meeting.

It was getting a little long in the tooth on the second day and I was having trouble concentrating, (sorry Benny) when a title flashed onto the screen that woke me up.

Boomers to Zoomers.

Honestly, I didn’t really know where this title was going, but it looked interesting.

Listening for a bit, though, made things come clear.

The question behind the title was, how do the baby boomers relate to gen x, or, the millennials in the work place.

I thought, “Ah ha! I’m going to finally see how this is supposed to be; I’ll be able to take this knowledge home with me and get those guys to harmonize better with how the business should run.

But what I brought home with me was decidedly different than what I expected to.

It became apparent early on in the discourse that it’s not so much about the old fogeys (like me) and our way of looking at things that is important.

Sure, our way of looking at things is important in the general puzzle of life.

But the piece we bring to the puzzle isn’t so big or noticeable as I thought.

The general idea at the meeting was that we needed to come to terms with those from the generations not like our own by understanding what the influences were that they grew up in.

For instance, if you grew up with a phone in your hand, (whether to excess or not, that’s for you to decide) you would be much more apt to use it and believe (mostly) in what it tells you rather than going about it some other way.

Or, we of the old fogey generation may say that we can’t get used to reading a book on our device, that we like the feel and smell of a book in our hands.

That’s true enough.

For us anyway.

So, as I delve into this way of thinking more, I come up with this.

One in my family, namely, one of the sweet daughters, uses this phrase a fair bit in her speech–Would you ever.

Like, Would you ever fill my car up with gas?

Or, Would you ever be okay if we skipped the family supper plans tonight since we have other plans that came up?

Another of the sweet daughters has taken to saying–I feel like.

Like, I feel like this gravy could use more salt.

Or, I feel like that guy just cut us off.

For a while, I made the tiniest bit of fun about the ‘would you ever’ preface to each sentence.

And I was (maybe) getting ready to make a little fun of the ‘I feel like’ prologue, but I was cut short when I heard a sixty something lady seated behind me at the coffee shop say ‘I feel like.’

But unfortunately for her, the rest of her coffee group were talking animatedly enough that they missed picking up on the fact that she wanted to contribute to the conversation.

Or, was it that she was speaking in a somewhat foreign tongue to their generation anyway, and therefore their ear didn’t pick up on it as quickly as it might have otherwise.

When I heard, ‘I feel like he needs,’ followed by ‘I feel like he needs,’ by still more ‘I feel like he needs,’ at last her group paid heed to her and I heard, ‘I feel like’ it will be that person missed out on some structure early in life.

And then the thing crystallized in my mind.

It sounded really off for her to say, ‘I feel like.’

I wanted to turn around and say, “Speak your generation’s language and then we’ll all pick up on it.”

It seems to me that when one generation tries to cross over and become another generation, confusion is much more likely to occur, and that confusion might be mostly in the one who is trying to cross over, because they have such a hard time getting their point across since nobody else is ‘feeling the conversation’ like the generation that coined the phrase does.

I realize this has its limits and we need to be flexible enough to change into the good points that another generation may teach us.

But for goodness sake, let’s each bring our own generational puzzle piece to the table, otherwise the puzzle will be a lopsided affair that never gets finished.

Guest Post

Why the Shepherds?

It’s Christmas time again. The story, the gifts, the family get-togethers, another
Christmas. Sometimes it seems all the going and doing gets a little humdrum and even
tedious.

But I’ve always done it and I’m sure I always will.

How is it that the story of Christmas can become so mundane?

We’ve all known it as long as we can remember, and it gets told every year but why does it seem that this great story can get almost stale?

As I was mulling over these and various other thoughts a few days ago, a question began to
flash across the dashboard of my mind.

“Why the shepherds?”

Now I know that the shepherds are as well known of a part as any other character in the Christmas story.

But why them?

The Story could have been complete and the ending unaltered even if they had
not been involved.

I imagine these were the lower-class uneducated men.

And how did they not lose their sanity when the angel appeared?

Man has been looking at the stars nearly as long as time has existed so for these men to see an angel flying at them must have been a little disconcerting.

Not to mention that the angels could have been sent to any number of destinations. They could just as easily have walked the main street of Bethlehem and caroled to a lot more people.

So why the shepherds?

I can’t say that I know.

I probably will never know for sure.

But one thing I do know.

The shepherds provide a good example for me today.

First off, they were dedicated. I imagine that tending sheep probably wasn’t a very
glamorous job, even in those days.

But those men or boys were out there, at night none the less, doing what they knew had to be done. They probably weren’t getting wealthy off of it, but it made a living and that was enough.

Second, they were brave. Brave enough to fight off the predators that no doubt threatened their sheep’s lives. Brave enough to not flee when a shining person dropped in front of them with a wild story of new life.

And perhaps most importantly, they were ready to go. They realized in a moment that what the angel had told them was far more important than the sheep they were watching. They were ready to run
into town, to find the baby, and worship Him.

And after they found the King, they were ready to spread the news through the town.

They didn’t pause at the fact that many people might view them as low class. It didn’t matter that it was the middle of the night.

They had to spread the news, and they weren’t going to wait.

So why the shepherds?

Common people doing common things.

Just like us.

Maybe that’s all the reason we need.

~Chad Smith

Cancer Survivor

I saw her in the Dillons parking lot.

She was parked as close to the entrance as possible, the way it looked.

Her head was wrapped in a turban and her movements were slow, tired looking.

Before I knew what I was doing I found myself standing by her cart, handing her the groceries out of it.

“Cancer survivor?” I asked.

“Yes.  I’m still in treatment and so is my husband.  We both have it.”

“Wow,” I said, “You are brave.”

“Yes,” she said, “I guess so.  Takes a lot to make it through each day.”

We were silent then as I took my time matching her pace as I handed her the rest of her groceries.

And then, I was mortified as I realized I was handing her purse to her. 

“Oh my,” I thought, “What will she ever think of me for handing her purse over,” as I realized how brash it seemed.

But she didn’t seem to notice.  

And it seemed she really meant it when she said thank you to me as I rolled her cart away to the cart corral.

But I felt helpless in spite of it all.

I couldn’t walk in her shoes; I didn’t even know her enough to call her in a week or so to see how she was doing.

I guess, in a way, cancer is a one-person journey as far as the diagnosis of it.

But surely, no one need suffer it alone.

For sure in this holiday season, when the big stores try to sell cheer as a commodity. 

“God, be with her,” I prayed.

And then I she left, and so did I.