It Is Only Mud!

I was going to stop at a nearby apple stand on the way to my doctor’s appointment, but was a wee bit tight on time. Thanksgiving would be missing something without my mom’s Dutch apple pie. It is my contribution to bring Michigan apples to Tennessee for the pies.

I had just loaded my precious apples into the front seat of my van when another customer arrived. The man had a couple of questions about the varieties and prices, and since he assumed I am a person who knows something, I helped him make his selection.

As I came back around my van to get into the driver’s seat, I noticed another vehicle in the circle drive way across the lawn. A woman was standing in front of it, looking stressed.

I called over to her, “Do you need some help?”

Nodding her head, she called back, “Yes, we are stuck.”

Thinking I was just doing some quick in-and-out-of-the-car errands, I had no hat or gloves. The wind was brisk as I walked across the lot.

A younger man, perhaps a son, was on his hands and knees, digging behind the back tire with a small stick. Dressed only in athletic shorts and a light jacket, he was down on the cold, damp ground.

“We could use some cardboard,” the woman said.

I hiked back across the lawn, and opened the back of my van. I knew I had unloaded some cardboard boxes earlier, sending them to recycling. I grabbed the only thing in there—a white rag rug. By standing on tip-toe, and leaning over the counter into the apple stand, I was able to reach a small board that had “PEACHES” painted on one side.

I hiked back across the lawn, clutching the rug in one hand and the board in the other.

The woman looked at the rug and shook her head, “I don’t want to get your rug muddy….”

“It is only mud,” I pointed out.

I was finally able to convince them we could use the rug under one tire and the board under the other for traction. Cautioning the woman to step on the gas very slowly, I went to the front of her vehicle to push. She got in, put the vehicle in reverse, and I pushed.

Success!

It is our experience that if we feel hateful, we act hatefully. If we feel loving, we act lovingly. Likewise, if we truly feel that everything and every one is an expression of the same one Reality that we ourselves are, we will act accordingly and will quite literally behave towards others as we would behave towards ourselves.

(The Transparency of Things, by Rupert Spira)

Today is only November 19, but the season of kindness has already arrived.

This year, let’s see if we can all remember it is only a rug, and it is only mud, whatever it is. Let’s be intentional to have kindness last until this time next year, and then let’s start the season of kindness all over again.

Here is the freshly washed rug, no worse for the wear.