It's Taken Years

Today, inspiration is a stranger.   I search my mind for a topic that is both current and edgy.  Let's face it, that is rarely my style.  I've always been very out of touch with the current fad or fashion.  When young, this lack did not serve me well.    I used to hate it because I felt it separated me from the masses.  Always the last picked for a team, rarely invited to others' birthday parties, I felt hopelessly out of step.  I felt like I was missing out.  Face pressed to the glass window of life's candy store, I could never go in and shop for the sweet things others took for granted.

Within the last year or two, as middle life takes an iron grip on my "young" psyche, I'm finally beginning to understand that those things which once seemed to keep me apart were actually gifts.  Just because I felt  different and in many ways was different from many of my peers, I was not an island alone.  I was an island within.  Rowing over to the shore of another island was always an option.   Trading island secrets and sharing strengths always a possibility.

Last Thursday, five of us showed up for our monthly bunco night.  Instead of playing we opted to just visit.  It was a good evening of informative, sometimes humorous, sometimes surprising, girl talk.  I learned a lot of things that evening that I didn't know before, things I couldn't easily find out by reading, things best found by listening to another tell about their own experiences.    One of the things I miss most about my current job is the lack of time to develop meaningful relationships with co-workers.  Rarely, having time to talk with other adults about anything not directly related to the student or the subject, leaves me feeling a bit like an island unto myself.   I am often lonely. Having an evening to talk and listen to others was a good thing.  I only realized how much I really enjoyed it later when I acknowledge  how rare those moments have become.

Even though I might feel lonely and separate and in some ways I know that I am,  I also know that feelings alone do not define me,  I am always part of a larger group, whether they acknowledge it or not.  The reverse is also true no matter how much I might fight against or deny it.   It's taken years for me to figure this out.

So as I sit here in MacDonalds, watching young children act like monkeys in the enclosed play pit, that I sometimes dub "the mouth of hell" for reasons obvious to those who cherish peace and quiet, I have to admit that like it or not, those monkeys swing in the same jungle as I do.  As I watch the parents of these monkeys and find myself judging or critiquing them less than kindly, I had to admit that they too are my fellow travelers.  They are here on earth with the same basic rights as I.   We breathe the same air, we move through time and space in the same era, we struggle to be good parents, we all fall short sometimes.  We are in this together.

Sometimes acknowledging this connection comes with good  feelings.  Yesterday, we were able to share in the wedding of one of my cousins.  Sitting in the little church of my childhood, seeing so many familiar and older faces, was a good thing.  This place, this church, these people,  for all the good, bad and indifferent are a part me and I of them.  Even if I were to never return, this place, these people would remain a  part of who I am.  I can choose to focus only on the bad and miss the good things that were also there.  Yesterday, this wedding helped me see more of the good. 

Whether it's good times with relatives or watching monkey-like children swing in the "Mouth of Hell", there are always more things that connect us than separate us.  It's time I really joined in.   Turn up the music, I'm going to enjoy the sounds of the human jungle before returning home and insisting on peace and quiet.  We all belong.