TRUSTWORTHY SAYINGS: February 2021

Sunday, February 28, 2021

The Second Sunday in Lent February 28, 2021

I Will, With God’s Help

by Malcolm McLaurin

Peter, Peter, Peter …

Let me be honest here. In some ways … in MANY ways, I find myself in the same boat as Peter. Wanting to deny the difficult, the scary aspects of discipleship. Peter was just being honest. He didn’t fully connect the dots. Yes, he truly and deeply believed that Jesus was the Messiah, but his definition was pulled from human sources. His definition was one that was fashioned by the world in which he lived, not the one that Jesus was revealing. His thinking was based on another model for Messiah-ship, not Jesus’s model. A Messiah who suffers? A Messiah who is rejected? A Messiah who is killed? These were not a part of Peter’s idea of the Messiah. Peter’s rebuking of Jesus reflects this. Peter’s rebuking reflects his shock and his fear.

Like Peter, I am often left in disbelief and denial about where Jesus is calling me to go. And while I may not rebuke Jesus (WOW! What a bold move), I do choose not to listen. Or maybe it is that I choose to listen— not to my heart and soul—but to my desire and fears. Their messages are clear. They tell me to turn my eyes away from injustice. To ignore the pain of others. To worry about me and mine. Their messages tell me that the material is the measure of worth. Their messages run counter to my baptismal promises. To seek and serve Christ in all, to love my neighbor and myself, to strive for justice and peace, and to respect the dignity of everyone. The messages from my baptism are dangerous, while the former are safe and comfortable.

I am reminded of a book I read last summer, The Hate U Give, by Angie Thomas. It is about a young black girl, Starr Carter, who, after witnessing a great injustice, is forced into making decisions between what is right and what is easy and comfortable. With each chapter we are witness to her struggles to make the right decision, but fear and the loss of comfort make a worthy opponent. While her decision did not ultimately shield her from danger and discomfort, it freed her to live the life she was being called into. It freed her to truly live.

Both Starr and Peter remind me that listening to and following Jesus, also known as discipleship, will often take us to places and situations that aren’t comfortable. Following Jesus often involves moving against the grain of the world around us. But following Jesus—discipleship—always leads to new life.

I wonder if there are places where fear and discomfort are keeping you from responding to God’s invitation to discipleship?

During this season of Lent, how might you commit to a practice of deeper listening?

Living Well Through Lent 2021

*Malcolm McLaurin is a senior seminarian at The University of the South: School of Theology in Sewanee, Tennessee, out of the Diocese of Olympia. Prior to seminary, he spent 20+ years as a lay minister in the Episcopal church in Arkansas, California, and Washington. His background is in children’s, youth, and young adult ministry. During his time at Sewanee he has discovered a deep love of the Old Testament and the Hebrew language. Malcolm is the father of two wonderful boys, Eli (13) and Myles (9), and the husband of a patient wife, Hannah. In his free time, he can be found reading, writing poetry, or engaging in his love of photography.

Saturday, February 27, 2021

Lenten Devotional Saturday, Feb. 27, 2021

Listening to Ourselves Takes Courage

by Scott Stoner

When hiking a trail, it is common to find benches along the way where hikers can stop and take a rest, like the bench we see on the front cover. I invite us to use today as a bench to sit upon and to take a rest, reflecting on the challenging work of listening more fully to ourselves that we have engaged in this week.

Dawna Wall described this challenging work of genuinely listening to ourselves in her reflection last Sunday. She reminded us that listening to ourselves can bring us face to face with our insecurities and frustrations. The temptation is to turn away and not listen.

We have learned this week that if we choose to avoid the challenging work of listening to ourselves, often we will prolong any difficulty we are facing. We have also learned that the choices we make regarding how we listen to ourselves set the patterns we have for listening to God, and listening to others.

So as we rest on this metaphorical hiker’s bench, let’s be gentle with ourselves, and celebrate and appreciate the inner work we have done this week. My hope is that our inner work will bear good fruit throughout the remainder of our journey through Lent.

Making It Personal:

Reflecting back over this past week, what was it like to focus on listening to yourself?

As we continue our focus on the theme of listening, is there one thing that you have learned so far that you want to be sure to hold on to throughout the remainder of this season of Lent?

Living Well Through Lent 2021

Please take a moment to comment as I monitor my post during Lent

to see if I should continue my blog postings. Thank you!

Friday, February 26, 2021

Lenten Devotional Friday Feb. 26, 2021

Listening With All Our Mind

by Scott Stoner

The Mind quadrant of the Living Compass includes Vocation and Organization.

We will focus on vocation in this reflection.

You may associate vocation with people who live a religious life as their chosen profession, such as priests and nuns. In truth, we all have a vocation, a calling in life. God has given each of us a unique set of gifts, as well as a unique role to fill in the world. Each of us is called to use our gifts and fulfill our roles in a way that honors and serves God.

It is also worth noting that our vocation is often separate from our paid work. Our vocation can be expressed in our relationships with friends, family, neighbors, and volunteer or service work that we may do. Our vocation can also shift over our lifetime, as we continue to encounter new opportunities to both clarify and express our gifts.

Frederick Buechner, author and theologian, wrote that “the place God calls you to is the place where your deep gladness and the world’s deep hunger meet.” Combining this with the quote above from Dorothy Day, we see that when we are living out our own unique vocation, we feel a deep sense of joy. As 1 Corinthians 12 also reminds us, “there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit,” and so, too, there are a variety of ways we can express our vocation throughout our lifetime.

Making It Personal:

Today I invite you to listen to your experience of vocation in your life right now.

How are you feeling about where your gifts and the needs of the world are intersecting?

Are you feeling the joy Buechner describes in this area of your life?

If not, is there a shift that perhaps you are being called to make?

Living Well Through Lent 2021

Please take a moment to comment as I monitor my post during Lent

to see if I should continue my blog postings. Thank you!

Thursday, February 25, 2021

Lenten Devotional - Thursday February 25, 2021

Listening With All Our Strength

by Scott Stoner

Once you start approaching your body with curiosity rather than with fear, everything shifts. —Bessel van der Kolk

Continuing our week’s focus on listening to ourselves, we now turn to the Strength section of the Living Compass, focusing on Care for the Body and Stress Resilience.

Most of us are familiar with the idea of body language. For example, if someone folds their arms and moves back, it could mean they are not open to hearing what we are saying. Whereas, on the other hand, if they lean and seem interested, it often means they want to listen. In this reflection, we will focus on our own bodies and how to be open to hearing what they might be saying to us.

Our bodies always tell the truth. If we get sick repeatedly, for instance, our bodies may be trying to warn us about the amount of stress in our lives, the current choices we are making around diet, sleep, and exercise.

If we don’t regularly listen to our bodies when they are quietly whispering to us, we may eventually find them impossible to ignore when they “shout” at us to get our attention. Bessel van der Kolk, M.D., author of the best-selling book, The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma, reminds us that our bodies internalize and hold on to stress and unresolved hurt. If ignored, our stresses and hurts will gradually build up until they demand to be heard.

Learning to listen to what our bodies are telling us with curiosity, instead of fear or judgment, is the first step in healing and resolving any stress or hurt we may be experiencing.

Making It Personal: What do you think of the idea that our bodies always tell the truth?

Are you aware of a time when you resisted a message your body was trying to give to you?

Take a few moments right now and listen compassionately to your body, being curious about what it might be quietly, or not so quietly, telling you.

Living Well Through Lent 2021

Please take a moment to comment as I monitor my post during Lent

to see if I should continue my blog postings. Thank you!

Wednesday, February 24, 2021

Lenten Devotional - Wednesday, February 24, 2021

Listening With All Our Soul

by Scott Stoner

Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.

—Matthew 11:28-29

The Soul quadrant of the Living Compass focuses on Spirituality and Rest & Play. One way in which these two areas intersect is with the spiritual practice of sabbath time.

The practice of taking time for sabbath is so crucial that it is one of the Ten Commandments. Whether we choose to observe one full day a week as a sabbath, or shorter periods of sabbath time throughout the week, any choice to be still and rest is genuinely a counter-cultural choice in our “busy-is-better” world.

Jesus talks about finding “rest for our souls,” which raises the question of what signs we might need to watch out for that are letting us know when our souls are tired and in need of rest. Here are a few signs that I have noticed in myself and others. See if any of these match your experience.

• Feeling chronically tired even when getting enough sleep.

• Compassion fatigue from giving so much of ourselves to others.

• Holding on to worries instead of releasing them into God’s care.

• Overworking and over-functioning to the point of exhaustion.

• Not being able to let go of mistakes you or others have made.

Listening to the signs of soul fatigue is the first step in addressing the problem. Next, we need to follow the words of Jesus in Matthew 11:29 and be “gentle and humble in heart” with ourselves and with others, as we turn to God for rest and renewal.

Making It Personal: As you pause and listen to your soul, do you hear any signs of soul fatigue? If so, gently and humbly name what you are experiencing. What is one specific thing you could do to create more sabbath time in your day or week, more time to turn to God for rest and renewal?

Living Well Through Lent 2021

Tuesday, February 23, 2021

First Week of Lent - Tuesday Feb. 23, 2021

Listening With All Our Heart

by Scott Stoner

Beginning today, and continuing through Friday, I will use the Living Compass Model for Well-Being and its four quadrants of heart, soul, strength, and mind to structure my reflections about listening to ourselves. Today we will focus on the Heart quadrant, which includes our Emotions and Relationships.

As a psychotherapist, I commonly meet with people who initially want help in getting rid of uncomfortable emotions, such as fear, sadness, anger, or anxiety. I typically respond that the most important first step is to begin by listening to what those troubling emotions are trying to say. Our emotions function like the warning lights on a car dashboard, letting us know that there is an underlying issue that may need to be explored and addressed.

Just as it is wise to learn to listen to uncomfortable emotions within ourselves, it is also wise to learn to honor and listen to discomfort if or when it arises in an important relationship in our lives. Ignoring uncomfortable feelings rarely helps them to go away. Instead, gently facing discomfort in a relationship, and risking what initially may be an awkward conversation, can be crucial in deepening and improving the relationship.

Because uncomfortable emotions, either within ourselves or in our relationships, are well, uncomfortable, it is understandable that we might want to avoid them. If we do that, though, often we will find that what we resist, persists, and that what we face, with time and care, can be resolved.

Making It Personal: As you listen to what’s happening right now with your emotions and/or your relationships, what do you hear? If you are experiencing any discomfort, can you sit with it to see what it has to teach you? What do you think of the idea that “what we resist, persists”?

Living Well Through Lent 2021

Monday, February 22, 2021

The First Week of Lent - Monday, February 22, 2021

Listening to Ourselves

by Scott Stoner

Your inner voice is the voice of divinity. To hear it, we need to be in solitude, even in crowded places. —A. R. Rahman

Each Monday we will introduce a theme for the week related to our overall theme of listening. This week our theme is “listening to ourselves.”

We start with the focus of listening to ourselves because we believe that how we listen to ourselves sets the pattern for how we listen in all other areas of our lives, including how we listen to others, and how we listen to God. If we are curious and open in listening to ourselves, we will be curious and open in listening to others. If we have a pattern of not listening well to ourselves, we will likely repeat that pattern in other areas of our lives, as well.

As the quote from A. R. Rahman states, when we listen to our inner voice, we are listening for how God is always whispering to us. When attended to, that inner, divine voice can serve as a compass to guide our lives. It can also serve as a guide for how to listen to others. Rahaman also reminds us that creating time for solitude and quiet within ourselves is essential for being able to hear the divine inner voice. In yesterday’s reflection,

Dawna Wall wrote about soul wrestling. She described well the biblical stories of people wrestling with their inner selves and with God as they seek healing, guidance, and wholeness. Sometimes soul wrestling is necessary to help us remove barriers that impede our ability to listen more fully to ourselves.

Making It Personal: How might you create some regular time of solitude to listen to the inner divine voice this Lent? Are you aware of any barriers within yourself that impede your ability to listen well?

Living Well Through Lent 2021

Sunday, February 21, 2021

The First Sunday in Lent - February 21, 2021

Soul Wrestling

by Dawna Wall

The Wilderness holds answers to more questions than we have yet learned to ask. —Nancy Wynne Newhall

It is often unsettling to realize anew that the distance from joy to despair is so short and also so long. Jesus, in offering himself for the cleansing ritual of baptism, has listened for and heard deep inside his soul that he is beloved and this knowledge spurs him toward the soul wrestling that devastates and renews. Soul wrestling is a familiar story in Scripture—we think of Jacob and the angel, of Hagar in the wilderness, of the many unnamed women and men who cry out, reach toward the healing love of God and limp forward, changed and blessed.

In our wrestling places we might ask for a sign, a promise, some hint that the anguish of this present moment is not all there is. Mark’s Gospel shrinks the story of Jesus’ wilderness time to a few sentences, but between the lines there is a world of experience. As there is with ours too. “It’s a long story,” we might say, without telling it. That’s where Jesus is—coming to terms with the hunger of body, mind, and spirit and, as he wrestles, reciting to himself the promises of Scripture that he knows by heart. All while listening deeply to what God is revealing to him in the wilderness.

As we seek to live well through Lent, we too will need to confront our wilderness places—wrestling again and again with the insecurities, the frustrations, the hungers that leave us feeling less than and not enough. Like Jesus we listen and watch for signs, in glimpses of rainbows, in refrains of Psalms—words and images to help us remember the way from despair to hope.

Poet and theologian, Pádraig Ó Tuama writes, “To engage with the text this way requires careful and heartfelt reading, noticing the nooks and crannies where the imagination can lodge, paying attention to the curiosities that emerge and creating a stopping-point there” (Daily Prayer with the Corrymeala Community, p. 61).

Honoring the stopping points, the rest areas, and the lookouts are all opportunities to assess where we are on our faith journeys. How we live well in the midst of deep sorrow and unexpected joy. Making space where our “imaginations can lodge” and engaging in curiosity as we look around and listen for where we have been, where we are now, and where we are going, are all ways that we honor those angular parts of our stories, the wrestling and the resolution.

Living Well Through Lent 2021

Saturday, February 20, 2021

Lenten Devotional Saturday, February 20, 2021

Talk Less, Listen More

by Scott Stoner

One who spares words is knowledgeable. —Proverbs 17:27

I regularly listen to the soundtrack from Hamilton: An American Musical. There is a line in the second song on the album, “Aaron Burr, sir,” that relates to our focus on listening.

In this song, we hear an anxious Alexander Hamilton meeting Aaron Burr for the first time. He is talking incessantly as he tries to get Burr’s attention. At one point in the song, after Burr has heard more than enough, he turns to Hamilton and says, “Let me offer you some free advice. Talk less, smile more.”

For our purposes, I would like to rephrase it slightly. “Let me offer you some free advice. Talk less, listen more.” Like Hamilton, I know I am especially vulnerable to talking too much when I feel anxious or insecure. As I have grown older, I have learned to become more comfortable with making room for silence in interactions with others, and not anxiously filling natural lulls in the conversation.

In her Ash Wednesday reflection, Lisa Saunders candidly shared how one year she gave up yelling at her children for Lent. Sometimes learning to talk less is not just about the number of words we speak, but also about the choice and tone of the words we use. Lisa expressed this when she wrote that she realized how the way she spoke impacted the way others felt. My prayer is that paying close attention to how we speak and how we listen will be an enriching Lenten discipline for us all.

Making It Personal:

Do you tend to talk at times more than you listen?

What are you aware of at this point that can help you to “talk less, listen more”?

In your prayer life, do you tend to spend more time talking than listening?

Living Well Through Lent 2021

Friday, February 19, 2021

Third Day in Lent - Friday, February 19, 2021

Third Day in Lent

Friday, February 19, 2021

Practicing Listening

by Scott Stoner

Practice makes progress, not perfection. —Unknown

I have been taking private Spanish lessons for the last two years. My teacher lives in Cuernavaca, Mexico, and we talk via Skype for one hour every week. There are two things that I have discovered from my experience of learning to speak Spanish that I would like to apply to our focus this Lent on listening.

First, I find that I am much better at speaking Spanish than listening to someone else speak it. Speaking is easier for me because I know what it is I am trying to say. Listening is more difficult because I have to intentionally focus all my attention on understanding what my teacher is saying to me. I find that my mind wanders more easily when I am listening to something I don’t fully understand than when I am formulating my own sentences, and so I must discipline myself to focus.

Second, my teacher always reminds me that if I genuinely want to improve both my speaking and listening, I have to practice, practice, and practice. We only become more proficient at something by practicing it, not by merely wishing to be more proficient.

The parallels here to our focus this Lent are clear. For many people, speaking seems to come more naturally than listening. Listening usually requires more intentional commitment and effort. If we want to enhance our ability to listen, we will need to practice, practice, and practice.

Making It Personal: Do you find that, in general, listening is more difficult than speaking for you? What helps you to focus as you listen to someone else? Are you ready to make a commitment this Lent to practice listening?

Living Well Through Lent 2021

Thursday, February 18, 2021

Second Day in Lent Thursday, February 18, 2021

Second Day in Lent

Thursday, February 18, 2021

Barriers to Listening

by Scott Stoner

Listening is essential for the development of intimacy, trust, healing, and wisdom. —Lisa Saunders

When you ask a young child to do something they don’t much feel like doing, such as picking up their toys or getting ready for bed, there is a reaction they commonly have that is simultaneously amusing and a bit off-putting. They cover their ears to keep from listening to what is being said to them. The logic is if they can’t hear, they won’t have to do what is being asked of them.

While I don’t do anything quite so obvious as putting my hands over my ears when someone is talking to me, I certainly can do other things that interfere with my being a good listener. I can, for example, interrupt a person speaking to me. I can pretend to be listening when, in fact, my mind is somewhere else. I can also multitask when someone is talking to me, which clearly says I am not giving them my full attention. Our focus for this Lent daily devotional is listening.

As we begin this journey, I invite each of us to become aware of things we do, intentionally or not, that limit our ability to listen well. As Lisa Saunders wrote yesterday, “Ash Wednesday is the start to a season inviting us to set aside or stop whatever gets in the way of our listening well.”

Making It Personal: What gets in the way of your ability to listen well to others? Can you think of a time recently when you did not give your full attention to someone? If so, what can you learn from that experience?

Living Well Through Lent 2021

Wednesday, February 17, 2021

Ash Wednesday 2021 Lent Season Begins

Ash Wednesday

February 17, 2021

Listening With All Our Heart, Soul, Strength, and Mind

by Lisa Saunders

The word “listen” contains the same letters as the word “silent.”

—Alfred Brendel.

One year for Lent I gave up yelling at my children.

They were ten, eight, and four. My volume control was no longer under control. I raised my voice far too often, making none of us happy. I told our children the plan. They were thrilled and took great pleasure in holding me accountable.

Of all the Lenten disciplines I have taken on through the years, this one stuck. I broke a bad habit. I had been yelling because no one appeared to be listening to me. As it turned out, the less I yelled, the more they heard me. And I found I was better at listening to them. It surprised me to realize that being good at listening is not just about hearing what someone says. It is also about how my listening makes someone else feel.

Ash Wednesday is the start to a season inviting us to set aside or stop whatever gets in the way of our listening well. The letters in the word “listen” can be rearranged to spell “silent.” I am not any good at silence. But I don’t think God yells, so if I want to hear God, I must get quiet. It is lovely to imagine that I might delight God by the way I listen.

Listening is essential for the development of intimacy, trust, healing, and wisdom. Listening to our loved ones (heart), to our longings (soul), to our body (strength), and to our insight (mind) are all forms of prayer and listening to God. I find that God speaks to me most often through other people, but I also hear God’s voice in my gut, in my bliss, and in my ounce of common sense.

Listening with our heart, soul, strength, and mind has restorative powers. Some pain cannot be taken away, but hurt that is heard can be eased. When we listen with a desire to understand and appreciate, we unfurl and expand. The woman who touched the hem of Jesus’ garment was healed of her disease. She also got to tell Jesus “the whole truth.” That he listened to her story likely healed her soul, as well. My two favorite Lents were those that I was on maternity leave. I didn’t take on any special Lenten practice, although I sacrificed sleep and sanity all forty days. I spent those Lents falling in love, nestling a grapefruit-sized head against my heart. I am spending this Lent nuzzling the head of my infant grandson. I am listening for his fretful cries, contented coos, and still, small voice. If I am quiet enough, I will hear the love between us flowing like a rushing river.

Living Well Through Lent 2021

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Tuesday, February 16, 2021

PREPARING FOR THE LENTEN SEASON 2021

Living Well Through Lent 2021

Listening With All Your Heart, Soul, Strength, and Mind

Quotes, Scripture & Prayers for Use During Lent

By being attentive, by learning to listen (or recovering the natural capacity to listen which cannot be learned any more than breathing), we can find ourselves engulfed in such happiness that it cannot be explained: the happiness of being at one with everything in that hidden ground of Love for which there can be no explanation.

— Thomas Merton, The Hidden Ground of Love: The Letters of Thomas Merton on Religious Experience and Social Concerns

A listening heart is always open, sensitive to the joy and pain of others, offering a space within itself for the other to enter. It gives each person what is so badly needed—an affirmation of their place in this world.

—Eliezer Shore

No one listens, they tell me, and so I listen … and I tell them what they have just told me, and I sit in silence listening to them, letting them grieve.

—Julian of Norwich

Listen, attune, and heed the inner Voice of Love. For in sacred Silence, we open ourselves to Wisdom, to ever deepening communion with the Source of all creation.

—Nan Merrill

Listening is where love begins. —Mister Rogers

Listen, listen Wait in silence listening For the one from whom all mercy flows. —Contemplative chant

Everyone is God speaking. Why not be polite and listen to Him?

—Hafiz

Somewhere we know that without silence words lose their meaning, that without listening speaking no longer heals, that without distance closeness cannot cure.

—Henri Nouwen

The beauty of listening is that those who are listened to start feeling accepted, start taking their words more seriously and discovering their own true selves.

—Henri Nouwen

All wisdom was the result of listening to one’s own soul.

—Paulo Coelho

The first duty of love is to listen. —Paul Tillich

Wisdom is the reward you get for a lifetime of listening when you’d have preferred to talk.

—Doug Larson

It’s not at all hard to understand a person; it’s only hard to listen without bias.

—Criss Jami

Good listeners are created as people feel listened to. Listening is a reciprocal process—we become more attentive to others if they have attended to us.

—Margaret J. Wheatley

The soul speaks its truth only under quiet, inviting, and trustworthy conditions.

—Parker Palmer

Before I can tell my life what I want to do with it, I must listen to my life telling me who I am.

—Parker Palmer

In the stillness of the quiet, if we listen, we can hear the whisper of the heart giving strength to weakness, courage to fear, hope to despair.

—Howard Thurman

Listen to me, O coastlands, pay attention, you peoples from far away! The LORD called me before I was born, while I was in my mother’s womb he named me.

—Isaiah 49:1

The Master, God, has given me a well-taught tongue, So I know how to encourage tired people. He wakes me up in the morning, Wakes me up, opens my ears to listen as one ready to take orders. The Master, God, opened my ears, and I didn’t go back to sleep, didn’t pull the covers back over my head.

—Isaiah 50:4

For God alone my soul waits in silence. —Psalm 62:1

O come, let us worship and bow down, let us kneel before the Lord, our Maker! For he is our God, and we are the people of his pasture, and the sheep of his hand. O that today you would listen to his voice!

—Psalm 95:6-7

Help, God—the bottom has fallen out of my life! Master, hear my cry for help! Listen hard! Open your ears! Listen to my cries for mercy.

—Psalm 130:1-2, The Message

YOU are invited to join me every day of the Lenten Season 2021 for a morning devotional thought beginning at 6:00am each morning. I pray God will speak to you during this time in 2021.

Living Well Through Lent 2021

Monday, February 15, 2021

That's the way it is in life...

Every year Martin's parents took him to his grandmother's house during the summer break and rode the same train home the next day.

Then one day the boy says to his parents:
' ' I'm pretty big now. How about I go to grandma alone this year?"

After a short discussion, the parents agree.
Standing at the platform, waving and giving him one last tip out the window while

Martin thinks:
' ' I know you've told me that a hundred times...!"

The train is about to leave and the father is whispering:
' ' My son, if suddenly you feel bad or scared, then for you! ' ' '
And he puts something in his pocket. Now the boy is sitting alone, sitting on the train, without his parents, for the first time...

He sees the passing landscape out the window, strangers around him rushing, making noise, coming and walking out of the compartment, the conductor addresses him that he is alone... A person even takes a sad look at him...

This is how the boy always feels more uncomfortable...
And now he's scared.

He lowers his head, cuddles in a corner of the seat, tears come to his eyes.
He remembers his dad putting something in his pocket.
With a trembling hand he is looking for this piece of paper, opens it:
' ' My son, I'm in the last car..."

That's the way it is in life...
We need to let our children run and trust them...
But we should always be in the last wagon so they don't be afraid...

Sunday, February 14, 2021

"We didn't have this 'green thing' back in my earlier days."

Checking out at the store, the young cashier suggested to the much older lady that she should bring her own grocery bags, because plastic bags are not good for the environment,.

The woman apologized to the young girl and explained, "We didn't have this 'green thing' back in my earlier days."

The young clerk responded, "That's our problem today. Your generation did not care enough to save our environment for future generations."

The older lady said that she was right our generation didn't have the "green thing" in its day. The older lady went on to explain: Back then, we returned milk bottles, soda bottles and beer bottles to the store. The store sent them back to the plant to be washed and sterilized and refilled, so it could use the same bottles over and over. So they really were recycled.

But we didn't have the "green thing" back in our day. Grocery stores bagged our groceries in brown paper bags that we reused for numerous things. Most memorable besides household garbage bags was the use of brown paper bags as book covers for our school books. This was to ensure that public property (the books provided for our use by the school) was not defaced by our scribblings. Then we were able to personalize our books on the brown paper bags.

But, too bad we didn't do the "green thing" back then. We walked up stairs because we didn't have an escalator in every store and office building. We walked to the grocery store and didn't climb into a 300-horsepower machine every time we had to go two blocks. But she was right. We didn't have the "green thing" in our day.

Back then we washed the baby's diapers because we didn't have the throw away kind. We dried clothes on a line, not in an energy-gobbling machine burning up 220 volts. Wind and solar power really did dry our clothes back in our early days.

Kids got hand-me-down clothes from their brothers or sisters, not always brand-new clothing. But that young lady is right; we didn't have the "green thing" back in our day.

Back then we had one TV, or radio, in the house -- not a TV in every room. And the TV had a small screen the size of a handkerchief (remember them?), not a screen the size of the state of Montana.

In the kitchen we blended and stirred by hand because we didn't have electric machines to do everything for us.

When we packaged a fragile item to send in the mail, we used wadded up old newspapers to cushion it, not Styrofoam or plastic bubble wrap.
Back then, we didn't fire up an engine and burn gasoline just to cut the lawn. We used a push mower that ran on human power.

We exercised by working so we didn't need to go to a health club to run on treadmills that operate on electricity. But she's right; we didn't have the "green thing" back then.

We drank from a fountain when we were thirsty instead of using a cup or a plastic bottle every time we had a drink of water. We refilled writing pens with ink instead of buying a new pen, and we replaced the razor blade in a razor instead of throwing away the whole razor just because the blade got dull. But we didn't have the "green thing" back then.

Back then, people took the streetcar or a bus and kids rode their bikes to school or walked instead of turning their moms into a 24-hour taxi service in the family's $45,000 SUV or van, which cost what a whole house did before the "green thing."

We had one electrical outlet in a room, not an entire bank of sockets to power a dozen appliances. And we didn't need a computerized gadget to receive a signal beamed from satellites 23,000 miles out in space in order to find the nearest burger joint.

But isn't it sad the current generation laments how wasteful we old folks were just because we didn't have the "green thing" back then?