LEFT BEHIND

He is now famous.  Known only as JR, this man has traveled the world taking pictures of people who are invisible to the dominate culture.  He began photographing immigrants and minority residences in a suburban town of Paris. He then enlarged the photos and put them on the sides of dilapidated buildings they inhabited. When riots broke out the following year, the world came to see and discovered his work. Now his work is in 140 countries and he has created a collage of selfies that have been sent to him and it covers the floor of the nave in Pantheon in Paris.

Aside from the pop-up art that he inspired around the world, what fascinated me in the article in the June 23, 2014 issue of Time Magazine was how JR got started. He had been a graffiti artist.  But, one day he found a camera on the Metro that someone had left behind. That discovery changed his life. Something lost by someone else became a door for a life of celebrity and art. 

I guess we never know what impact we have.  Things that we may have outgrown or left behind may become something that changes the life of another person. We often think that the way to make it in this world is to have a dream or vision and then work hard to fulfill that vision.  And certainly there is evidence that such action can result in achieving our goals.

But, don’t under estimate the power of surprise. We never know what our actions might produce.  What we leave behind in our life, the love or compassion, the kindness or tender touch, might just be the gift that opens the door for someone else to discover their future. I doubt that the person who left behind the camera on the Metro on Paris even realizes what an impact he has had on the world of art.

MIND BREEZE

He was standing beside the trail.  Fifteen feet away, on a long leash, the little white poodle stood and stared.  I hiked by—greeting the old man and acknowledging the dog. Not moving, the dog just stared.  The man spoke, “Her get up and go has got up and went.” 

And for a moment, I felt, like a gentle breeze,the spirit of my Daddy.  He used to say, “My get up and go has got up and went.”  And then, In the brief passing, the aroma of my Daddy infiltrated my body. 

Father’s day comes around every year.  Someone said that we need to acknowledge our fathers.  And so we have a ritualized time to think, to thank, to talk about those men who might have blessed our lives.  We remember their all to human qualities through which we might have glimpsed divine love. 

But, I think I prefer my Dad moments like I had on the trail—breezes of memory that tousle my hair and tickle the senses. They sneak up on me like the smell of the old Model T exhaust that puts me back on the wooden knee of my Granddad who took me and my sibs over to the gas station in southern Oklahoma and gave us a penny to put in the gum-ball machine where two or three trinkets were dispenses with each piece of gum.  

They bring tears to my eyes as I smell the aroma of machine oil that impregnated the overalls as I ran to hug “Daddy-Buggin” as he came home from the machine shop where he worked to provide a living for his wife and five children. 

Or, the scrub of a man’s beard on my cheek and I am right back in my Daddy’s lap being rubbed by his Saturday unshaved chin.  Oh, how I long to tell him how much those times meant to me. 

These are the moments of memory I love.  They surprise me, reminding me of the presence that is so deeply woven into my soul that it takes an unguarded word, smell or touch to open my mind and heart to the gifts that have blessed me. This way, father’s day comes here and there, now and then, more like the reality of deep love than in just on a calendar date once a year.

Candy Bar Corner

It was a street corner filled with flying candy bars. Bitter cold January morning in Indianapolis, sun struggling to make a difference, and I was on my way to the office. I stopped at 75th and Shadeland and there in the middle of the intersection were flying Snickers and sliding Three Musketeers. Three boxes of candy bars were being mauled as cars raced by, tires flipping cold and chaotic candy bars all over the intersection.

I wondered, "Where are all the kids?" I was tempted to stop in the middle of the intersection, get out of my black Subaru GT and like a kid chasing dollar bills dropped from the back of a Brinks truck, collect as many of the unmashed bars as I could gather in my arms.

But, I didn't stop. I watched, and as the light turned, I drove over the hapless bars and headed on to work. I wondered, "What happened to the little boy who grew up at his parents Dairy Queen in Monett, MO? Where is the little guy who excitedly spotted a penny in the gravel of the parking lot, picked it up, polished it off and carried it carefully in to share the good news with my mother? Where is the little boy who delights in the little sweet gifts that fall from the sky (or from the pocket of some unsuspecting customer, or from the back of some truck carrying candy bars)?"

I wondered, "Have I become so gorged on the sweet gifts of life that I fail to delight in the little ones that fall in my path? Have I become so accustomed to having what I need and getting what I want that I fail to notice the candy bars that just appear out of no where? Am I so busy and moving so fast that I fail to stop and pick up the unexpected delights that fall my way? Am I part of a society that is so obsessed with getting somewhere we are not that we fail to delight in where we are?"

I don't know what candy bar corner was all about. I don't know where the candy came from. I don't see many people buying whole boxes of candy bars in the grocery store. I seldom see boxes of candy bars being carried down the street in open trucks. (The fact is, I seldom see food of any kind in open bed trucks where it could fall off-except tomatoes in the summer heading for the Red Gold factory in northern Indiana). As far as I could tell these wayward collections of wrapped calories just fell from the sky to stir storm-like in the middle of that unsuspecting intersection.

But, what I do know is that I might stop in the racing around of my life and notice the moments that come to me in the lives of other people who come my way. I have missed much because I failed to slow down and pick up the pennies that others have discarded. I have sought to fill my soul with "meaningful and purposeful" activity and in the process, missed the delight of "sweets from heaven" that simply come for a moment and lend light to my soul.

I suspect those candy bars don't really have any purpose or meaning. But, I am grateful they slowed me down to notice my own life.