elusive green





WOLFGANG MIEDER calls the phrase “The grass is always greener on the other side of the fence" AN AMERICAN PROVERB OF DISCONTENT.

Lately I have been trying to figure out if the color green really does exist. Or, more accurately, is green a color I can actually grasp!

I am sitting in a 5 x 7 grey office cubicle in rural East Texas. The temperature is reaching the mid 90’s these days and the humidity is pore-cleansing high. Earlier I walked across the lawn from my office building to get a cup of coffee in the cafe. This week’s special latte is called “Soft Jolt.” The grass under my feet was getting to that crunchy green/brown stage from the hot beating sun and too little rain.

I have friends all over the world.

My friends in the Sudan write amazing journal entries and post photos of beautiful smiling people dressed in vivid Technicolor garments, walking across the smooth tan desert. Desert as far as the eye can see. Their thermometer in the Sudan this week said 144 degrees in the sun! But it still looks “greener” over there to me.

I have friends onboard a ship that is sailing off the coast of West Africa as I write this. The crew of over 300 will have an Equator Crossing Party tonight and celebrate, together, this momentous occasion. They are also on sailing-imposed water restrictions, including lukewarm 2 minute showers, no laundry, and won't be able to step foot on solid ground for almost 2 weeks! But it still looks “greener” onboard that ship to me.

• I worked in a hospital laboratory for over 10 years and thought it looked "greener" to have a desk job with paper clips, and a matching tape dispenser and stapler.
• I am single and sometimes think it looks “greener” to be married.
• I am a career volunteer and literally live off of the generous hearts of those who support me financially…but the regular paycheck I used to take for granted looks “greener” to me sometimes.
• I don’t have a house, but when I visit my friends’ homes with Fiesta Ware dinner plates and scented candles on the mantle; it looks “greener” to me to have a place of my own.

I like what Wolfgang Mieder goes on to say about “The grass is always greener on the other side of the fence:”

“A scientific scholar proves that optical and perceptual laws alone will make the grass at a distance look greener to the human eye than the blades of grass perpendicular to the ground. The "truth" of this metaphorical proverb can, of course, also be observed often enough in the countryside when a cow or a horse is trying to get at that juicy green grass just on the other side of the fence. And since people are equally dissatisfied with their lot in life, it should not surprise anyone that a modern psychologist has spoken of "the 'greener grass' phenomenon" by which modern individuals continually evaluate supposedly better alternatives for themselves.”

Paper clips, desert simplicity, adventures at sea, regular paychecks, Fiesta Ware…all would likely slip through my fingers if I tried to grasp them for myself just because they seem “greener.” I want to contentedly eat the grass on MY side of the fence, until it is time for a Sovereign change of pasture.

I think I need another Soft Jolt...

reverberations...

Tsunami

Two days ago, in East Texas, I had a "chance conversation" with a woman I had only just met. In the conversation, I learned that she was preparing to travel to Switzerland to attend the funeral of a close friend of hers. I was completely shocked to discover that this friend of hers was also a friend of mine that I had lost contact with a number of years ago. This mutual friend, Carole Streuli, had been missing since the December 26 Tsunami disaster shook the world.

(AOL News, January 2005)
“Two weeks on, the Earth is still vibrating from the massive
undersea earthquake off Indonesia, Australian researchers said
Sunday...the reverberations were similar to the ringing of a bell...”

Poet Luci Shaw writes on 1/14/05:

Two weeks on, and the planet is still
droning like struck metal. The low coastlines
shiver. The next wave threatens
to wipe them away like dust on a shelf.
On a flight the laptops deploy all around me,
played by virtuosos, but not
a single musical note. Birds do better;
water dripping in a bucket after rain;
crystal clinked with a spoon to get
our attention. The drumming
of short-term thunder.

But nothing chimes like the great gong
at the heart of the globe. Circling out,
the ripples trouble the waters within us,
each of us waits for the chiming of the next bell,
the tectonic tremors of a subterranean giant
shifting in his bed, heaving his great metallic bulk
until the oceans lift and hurl themselves abroad in
green speeding mountains.

The remains of Carole Streuli's body have only recently been discovered and identified. Again... reverberations. Her grieving, weary parents will finally be able to bury their daughter. Carole's brother, who himself barely survived the Tsunami by clinging, broken-bodied, to a tree, will finally come to another level of acceptance, and bury his sister. And many others, family and friends of Carole Streuli, will feel the effects of the Tsunami again.

Reverberations. I felt those effects as I sat across the table in that "chance conversation." Until that moment, I had only grieved indirectly for victims of the Tsunami. Like most of us, I had watched from afar, the horrific recounts of the disaster that day. The reverberations of that ringing bell of unimaginable proportions had not touched me on a personal level...until two days ago.

Now, I also grieve with a depth I have not known. Over 176,000 people are confirmed dead since the Tsunami. That number continues to grow. Along with uncountable others, Carole Streuli's life is still reverberating in hearts around the world.

Yet another reminder...

remind me...

I chose the words "remind me..." as the title to this journal of thoughts because I so often struggle to keep focused on what exactly it is I am to be about. I read this verse today (again) and it tells me...EXACTLY.

Is not this the kind of fasting I have chosen:
to loose the chains of injustice
and untie the cords of the yoke,
to set the oppressed free
and break every yoke?

Is it not to share your food with the hungry
and to provide the poor wanderer with shelter—
when you see the naked, to clothe him,
and not to turn away
from your own flesh and blood?

Isaiah 58:6-7

How can I ever forget?