Listen to the experiences, if not the facts

Here's what it's going to come down to: people will need to convince their fellows.  Co-workers will need to talk each other about their different experiences on their commutes.  Neighbors will need to decide how they act toward one another, whether or not they wave as they are out walking their dogs. Extended families will have to decide if they are excited about the new baby in the family, whose parents are the gay couple.  It will have to be about small things, not larger political issues like abortion, funding weapons programs or the economy.  It will have to be about whether or not the Sandy Hook school shooting actually happened, if you saw swastikas and racial slurs on someone's house.  The things we never thought we'd have to try to convince each other of.  

It's not a national conversation about reconciliation.  It's millions of individual conversations between people who form a network, who stand together, who exchange.  It's not a one-time vote; it's an everyday attitude.  It's not a lofty idealism of being at peace with yourself. It's not being complacent, asking someone, "You really believe that?" about a myriad of headlines, quotes, accusations.  Fact-checking has been dismissed.  There's no point; Fact and Truth are now considered mutable words.  We can work to come back to facts and we should uphold the sources we know are factual.  But to make an immediate difference, we need to find another way.

We now find ourselves having conversations about factual statements the same we have uneducated conversations about drug interactions.  Today, I took an ibuprofen for a headache; my co-worker says actually what I need is aspirin. 

"Ibuprofen is an anti-inflammatory," she tells me.   She's probably right, it's not what I need for my headache.  

"Can I take an aspirin right after taking ibuprofen?" I ask her.  

"Sure."

So I do. Even though I have this vague recollection of staggering different kinds of medicine from a previous experience after surgery, I don't call my doctor's office. I ask the woman without the medical degree who is handing me a remedy, completely comfortable with the conflicting knowledge that the drug is both powerful enough to cure my headache and also not worth my time to double check its possible side effects on my health. 

And this is the model for the kinds of interaction we are having now.  You don't believe in climate change?  "Ehhhh, I'm not a scientific person," said one woman on an NPR interview.  And right there, she popped the pills.  No amount of citation, no link to a scientific study is going to convince her. She simply doesn't care if it's true because there's a remedy for her headache, her fill-in-the-blank other problem that's not climate change.  Her concern is more immediate and she's not interested in the grand scheme of things and how climate change actually impacts a multitude of economic factors that may actually impact her immediate source of suffering, blah blah blah.  She doesn't care about the side effects.  

The majority of people who have been asked why they voted for the president-elect stated 1 of 2 things: 

1. his opinion on one issue matched theirs so they aligned themselves on this one issue while neglecting all the others, (like his stance on repealing the ACA but completely ignoring that white supremacists embrace him).

2. or they express an obtuse overall feeling like wanting change while also not being interested in how it happens, ("drain the swamp" without caring about the details).

The conversation is no longer that some people believe the holocaust never happened.  Now it's that a radio personality without credentials states Sandy Hook never happened.  (This is untrue.)  This man has no basis for it, but will spout it, and people will believe it. Something recent, on our soil, also with survivors' accounts and eye witnesses, now completely held in question.

So it's going to have to be each individual having human contact, sharing their stories that will make a difference.  One to one.  ​Our stories are where we start to understand. They by their very nature give 1 person a platform for expression while also engage an active listener.  Stories break down barriers.  Stories are also not subject to facts, but are our own words and have their own merit. If we're not dealing facts anymore, then let's deal in personal experience. Stories don't need to be universally true because there are 2 sides to every story.  And this is the pivotal point that will break open the fact vs. fake news frustration.  It's hard to refute eye witness accounts and personal stories about how people were affected by Sandy Hook.  

Why are people upset?  What prompted their vote to be swayed one way or the other?  Let them tell you their story--not their rhetoric, not their opinion, not their stance.  Their story.  

Growing Into

You'll Grow Out Of It, by Jessie Klein.  If you haven't read it, I highly recommend it.  It's about a young woman who has pretty much been a tomboy all her life and then, as all girls are, is suddenly expected to be interested in and know how to use make up, to think lingerie is a fabulous idea.  But she bucks the late bloomer stereotype and her coming of age essays are hilarious.  And underlying it all is this idea that there is a self, deemed childish, that you grow out of, that you shirk off for more adult and antiquated ways.  There is a mold that we all naturally grow into. And if you don't firm up when the others do, don't worry, you'll grow out of it.  Her example of not fitting the mold but also not settling for an outcome she doesn't want is apt.  No woman is defined by lip gloss.  You don't need to grow out of anything.

I felt a bit like that girl when trying to find a place for my family on Sunday mornings.  We don't fit into a traditional gathering.  We have some pretty radical ideas for people from West Michigan.  I have been told I would grow out of those notions.  But--and it's happened to me a couple times now--I'm one of the younger people in my crowd.  Look around you at the people who govern, who volunteer, who share their tremendous talent.  Those whose radical act may be to just come and sit each Sunday, to be present, and presente.  These are my examples. These people have not grown out of it.  I, am not growing out of, but into.

Recently we have seen some tremendously upsetting things.  We have been told we'll have to get used to it. That people are sick of these ideas.  To me that sounds a lot like you'll grow out of it.  Well, I know how that turned out.   I found people who have been not getting used to it for a lot longer than I have.  Who show me how to make what's in my heart shine brighter.  How I shouldn't give up on that, shouldn't and shouldn't have to get used to it  And I thank you for that. It has given me tremendous hope of late.  So let me give you some: take heart.  I promise you, I will not grow out of this.

Buoyed

I recently subscribed to a blog about a thankful boy and momma, after hearing about it so much from people I love and trust. And because I finally remembered to do it at a time when I was in front of a computer on my own time.  A recent post was one of disappointment, post election day, and the lack of underlying sentiment in a Sunday service.  A sentiment about the values this mom's gathering promises to uphold.  We non-churchy people, who don't ascribe to or comply with any particular faith, who follow values over doctrine, were as shocked and stunned as the rest of the world on Nov. 9th  All arguments as to whether we should have been or not aside, what we're left with is what we've got--a conundrum: how do you include people in respect of one another's opinions whose practice it is to disrespect?  

Respecting someone else's opinion is for things like debating movie plots, not about whether every citizen has the same rights as a white male.  It's not my favorite standard but it drives home the point.  If you believe any other citizen--straight, non-white, different religion, disabled, different gender--should not have the same freedoms as a while male, then you need to take a good, long look at why.   

And when your faith/values community fails to speak out in exactly these terms, addressing this very point?  What then?  Lots of people have a crisis of faith community: Don't like the new pastor.  Don't agree with what edict came from Rome.  But in respect to this specific question?  When the values that drive your faith are not addressed or glossed over in a message of unity rather than pointing out the let down of the values the community purports to be based on?  I feel for her.  

I feel for her because my community responded.  And it responded precisely as I feel--as our values claim--we should have responded.  We handed out the biggest safety pins we could buy.  You need to be able to see them from afar, to be a beacon.  ​I am troubled too, but I am buoyed.  And I wear a safety pin not only as the mark of a safety zone, but as a mark of my call to action.​  This is a constant reminder of what to do, how to intervene, to speak out.  A safe zone isn't enough.  We need a No More zone.  

​I don't have a symbol of my faith--no cross, no star--but I choose this.  ​Have always chosen this.  And now, with the symbol borrowed from Brexit, I pin it on the outside every day so we can all see it.  Every. Day. 

Kindly Optimism

I've been exposed recently, through a lecture and some podcasts, to the newest generation of young adults.  Which is not to say that people 18-25 aren't a part of my normal day, as they are for anyone living in the world, but I've been specifically subjected to their collective point of view through a couple pointed circumstances.

The first was a lecture, during a Sunday morning gathering.  My place of worship is not the normal church--not a church at all really--and that's part of what attracted this young woman to our group.  So when I say Sunday morning service, I don't mean, "at church".  I mean the place where me and bunch of other people go and sit through the semblance of a standard church service program like readings, gathering words, an offering, etc.  But the community is values based rather than doctrinal so any mention of Jesus holds as much power for us as Martin Luther King or Rumi.  Being values-based was the point of her talk and the reason for her visit.  And this was one of her points.  The talk was about Millennials and their search for humanitarian rather than religious spirituality.

And it exposed me to a mind set that, although I think myself enlightened for being part of this Sunday group who is concerned with the root values rather than the dogma, was an eye-opening experience into kindness as a way of life.

I am a mixture of cynicism and optimism. I love the scathing set-downs of 19th century literature but I am also and generally an upbeat person.  So I thought.  Being grounded in literature, irony is like air.  So a sunny disposition is always paired with a foible, however small.  Being compassionate and kind is at the heart of every teaching of my Sunday gatherings and I try to follow closely.  But it's more of a call to action, a challenge to consistently remember. This young woman brought kindness as I know it to a new level.  It wasn't a personal struggle, not an epic battle to try to find commonality with enemies.  She and her generation just feel it's always better to remember to give the benefit of the doubt and that opposing opinions have value.  My struggle emerges from an evolution of Christian doctrine: love thy enemy.  Her doctrine is 1 step beyond that.  Her perception comes from seeing values as the first step, not an evolved second step.

And I speak broadly about her generation because she herself cited other published and recognized people in her global age group. 

I realized that although I think of myself as an optimist, I don't maintain the idea that world will get better and better.  I don't hold out hope that it will, believe that reality is possible.  And she does.  What's more, she's not sure how she and her fellows will get there, but they believe that the way will open for them.  And not naively.  Perhaps with unadulterated buoyancy, but not without understanding the problems of the world.  These young people are not ignorant, nor are they ignorant in their assumptions.  They did not grow up with "Do or do not. There is no try."* They know there will be setbacks and they accept this as part of the process. They are simply undaunted.  In a way that I am daily...not.  They don't see the world as kind-hearted; they know better.   But they go kind-heartedly into the world.  It's the difference between me telling my son, "Every time you don't recycle when you could have, you are ruining your future!" and her saying, "We need to reach out to people and help make recycling easier so that everyone can do it." 

*To be fair to Yoda, and his whole universe which I still love, his point was to be all in.  Make up your mind that this is what you are going to do and keep doing it until you get it.  Believe that you can and you will.  So essentially the same thing as what my lecturer believes.  It's all semantics of course, but isn't that part of the point, how the message gets delivered?  What helps to shape your mindfullness?

I like this view.  I'll expose myself to more of it.  I'll be curious to see how my pre-teen son grows into young adulthood and what optimism looks like then.

That Bond is Broken

I have wondered why, when we did what we thought the Universe was telling us to do, are we in such a mire?  We have always been lucky, from early on.  The Universe was there for us, a substitute for God, theology, Master of the Universe...so many of those other caps to our over-arching existence.  It was an interpretation of own brand of divinity, freeing in our possession of it, different from any other. We have not been without our pitfalls, but for the most part, we have trusted the signs, followed the inner voice and trusted what the Universe was telling us.  And then, like the most miserable Job, were left out to dry.  There was not a series of tests of our faith; our Universe, when we loved it, did not do that.  It was not cruel.  It was not always apparent, but when it spoke, we knew it. And we listened.
Then and still, years of turmoil.  The kind of turmoil that breaks up marriages, drives people to homelessness, hopelessness, suicide.  Job seems a likely comparison.  But our Universe has not stepped up as even God did in the end for Job.
Yet still I kept looking for it to, kept trying to see signs, to notice what it wanted me to see and try not to hold a grudge.  Still it did not prove itself.  Has not.  And, I have come to realize, never will.  That bond is broken.
I still feel we did the right thing, moving our family back, even though it seems we are working against the current.  At every turn there is difficulty, a solution available but just out of reach.  And not just in concept only.  Twice, a house for sale, twice offers made and twice fallen through.  It's taunting almost, if I still believed in a Universe interested in me particularly.  But I can't.  Won't.  Because I can't be disappointed anymore.  I'm tired of waiting for this friend I thought I had to take me back after our rift.  Tired of waiting for my let-down lover to prove himself.  It won't happen.  Any goodness we receive now, any boons, come not from benevolent omniscience.  Come not from finally having passed tests and proving ourselves worthy.  Come not from a reconciliation of compromise on both our parts.  There is no governing force in my life any longer.  I can not tolerate that opinion.  I cannot listen to it any more.  If it happened to work for me before, in whatever form, yet now it makes me jaw-clenching furious to hear of one door closing and another opening, I must realize that I cannot have it both ways.  I cannot cringe with fury at the religious atonements uttered for shit times and also hope for my peculiar brand of Universe to come back to me.  They are one and the same.  Either you buy into it in its entirety and you find solace, or don't.  This move was right for us whether the deity wanted it or not.

"How many times have I lived this life?  Have I ever gotten everything right?  It's too late to start again.  And it's to early to give in."* It's too early to give in.  I continue not because I find a sustained faith in a God, not because I have found my Universe at my back again, not because my trust has been renewed.  I continue because I am here.  Because I can either do or not. I refuse signs and portents that come from an all powerful anything.  I deny it my supplication and pandering.  I will find and follow my own way, make my own connections and create my own moments.  I have no affiliation, no bond, no allegiance but to this life.  Because it simply is.  It is here and I am here and I will live it.  It is freeing to have no ties, no dogma, no unfulfilled ordained mission.  If this gives me no peace, then it will be own disquiet, my own to harbor, my own to douse.
*quote from Death of Me, by Channing and Quinn.

Winter Solstice

Now is the time of quiet.  After the melee of merriment and the panic of presents now is the time to settle in. Now comes the time to slow down again.  If there are parties still to be had, let us attend them at a leisurely pace, with a glow of kinship and a slow blink that sees it all.  If we find ourselves of an evening alone, let us melt into it without fear and be content with our quiet bustle.
Solstice has come and gone leaving the longest night behind us and the celestial new year ahead.  But there are still many dark nights to be had.  Do not wish them away because they are this side of the holiday.  Enjoy them.  For they are as much a part of the holiday as the holiday itself.  They are the time we need to
re-accustom our rhythm.  It is only in the darkness that we see the holiday lights dotting the the path ahead. Notice them.  Not just those in front of you, a spectacle of scenery, for that time has passed.  But look now to those further out as you travel, springing up along the way ahead.  Now is not the time to whip our faces from window to window to catch the best display.  You will not have missed the fanciest show; you will not have lost out.
We will be tempted, again as always, to rebuild, to retrench, reshape, renew--as though these things happen in an instant.  There will be more sales and chatter and offers...but this is the time of quiet.  Begin again as the the new year begins: gradually and steadily; in decreasing darkness, with beacons to beckon until they are not needed anymore; with a slow putting away of all things in their place.  Do not skip this next span of time, this next step.  It is much needed and you will miss it.
Leave the spectacle behind.  Enjoy the lights standing out against the night.  They belong here, common beacons toward a purpose.  Let them stand for their original purpose, to be bright spots in a season of night. Now is the time of quiet.  Let us use it.

Being Young

I am young.  I know this.  I knew it at 16, when my grandparents couldn't believe how fast I'd grown up.  I knew that I would one day say the same thing of some young person.  I was never naive enough to think I wouldn't one day be a grandparent as well, or a great aunt, and have those same thoughts.  I didn't know how it would feel, to see a baby I could remember stuffing cake into her mouth at her 2-year old birthday party suddenly almost graduating from high school, but I knew enough to know that someday I would feel it.

I knew it at 25 when my insurance rate went down and I suddenly felt like an adult with responsibility, wise and with a car.  I knew this was lie and I was actually still young and when someone, a co-worker maybe, 50 years old, told me, "You're still just a kid!"  And they were right.   I knew they were.  I was young, but 50 wasn't old.  Fifty was just later.  80 was old.

Now I am 42 and I know that I am still young.  I know that I am almost the people I thought were middle aged when I had my first child at 30.  I am almost middle age.  Might be except Middle Age is now older than 42.  But the 81 year old scoffs.  "You're so young!"   And now, 81 doesn't seem old.  91 maybe...

And I will know when I'm 92, even while I am that daffy old lady relegated to the comfy chair in the corner, thankful to not to have to pay attention so closely and left to doze off if I want,   I will know that in my heart and mind I'm really only 60.  92 is the new 60.

Even this, my vision of my 92 year old life, proves that I am young.  Only the young would assume that there is time to rest on the horizon.  For at each age, do we not find that there is always something more to do?  Some other cause to put our efforts to?  We are never dozy.  Tired from exams, yes.  Exhausted with a new baby, yes.  Fed up and frustrated with those we think should act according to their age, position and status--yes.  But to just wander off in a dream?  No one but the young think this frivolity is what is waiting in the land of Getting Older.

Paying rent terrified me when I first had to.  It terrified me that I would need to come up with and pay $400 a month for a place to live.  How was that accomplished?  How did adults garner such sums?  I was young.  I didn't realize that saving money is not the same as making it.  Squirreling away birthday checks and chore money, babysitting fees over a period of months does not compare with a job and earning potential.  Rent represented a leap of faith in a world I had not experienced but was expected to assimilate into.  And it happened; I did it. I worked 40 hours; I paid $400 dollars.  And more.  Because there are other adult things like the price of gas per gallon and soup on sale.
Parenthood is exciting.  I was not scared about being a parent, just hopeful that I could be consistently as kind and inspiring in reality as I envisioned myself to be when imagining imparting advice and guidance to my little ones.  Paying rent prepared me I guess.  Or Life keeps happening, whether you pay the rent or not.  If the baby is on the way, it will be here whether you are prepared or not.  I am young, but I know these things.  I know I don't completely understand them.  But even in this there is wisdom: be open-hearted; be willing.  In this there is a kernel of what we always know, even before we learn it.  I cling to the kernel, try to remember that I know it, that I can recall it when I need to, whatever my age.  I am young; be young with me.

Do Unto Others evangelical misconception

Do unto others as you would have done until you.  This is the fundamental point of most religions in the world.  But if you follow it, you had better be prepared to fully accept this statement.

I've been thinking lately about this directive as it applies to people whose theology I do not agree with.  I have always felt that if you choose to be a Christian--feel compelled, are drawn, witnessed, etc.--then that is your choice and I stand by your right to choose.  But don't try to witness me.  That is not my choice of religion.  Don't put that theology on me because it is your way of life.  Allow me the same courtesy of choosing my path, albeit different in such a fundamentally opposite way.  If you truly believe that you should Do Unto Others, would you not allow this for someone else as well?  If you want to be free to choose your path, do you not allow others to choose theirs?  And then it occurred to me: probably you would not. 
Maybe this is the point I've been missing when I get so frustrated and downright ornery about people stopping me on the sidewalk, out of the fricking blue to ask me if I've accepted Jesus Christ as my personal savior.*  I am a magnet for this, or was these past few years. Rant on why I look like a good target for conversion aside, I have had ample opportunity to mull this over.  Stuck in my craw more like.  (One instance happened while I was visibly pregnant and I got the distinct impression I was being recruited because of my double potential.  Ick.  Ok, small rant.)
Perhaps this is how evangelicals want to be treated.  Perhaps they do wish this is how someone would treat them.  Or they remember fondly seeing the light. "If I were an unsaved soul, I would want someone to come along and show me the Way."  But there's a fallacy of logic here.  You can't want something retroactively.
If you are wandering around without Jesus, you can't be saved, and then apply your current state to a past one.  You as your Saved Self cannot change the past.  You cannot say "I wanted this then."  Not without adding "But I didn't know it at the time".  I want lots of things that I won't in the future.  The grass is always greener.  It is incorrect to be able to apply a current state of mind to a past self.  That's why the phrase "If I'd only known then what I do now" was invented.  You didn't know. You didn't want.  Within that thought is the admission that you did not want or know what you do now.  
I can want people to be able to choose their path, even if I don't agree with it.  I want them to allow me to do the same.  This is a current and present reciprocation. Do evangelical people want me to stop them and try to sway them to my theology?  I suspect not. Yet this is the equivalent, linear reciprocation of their approach.

And it comes down to this: Can I shake your faith, evangelical person? Is there anything I can say that will make you not believe?  (Hell) No.  Then you must accept that this perfect state exists for other people too, in some other way.  I cannot tell you why I don't believe as you do.  I just don't.  I don't feel it.  But I do feel, just as strongly as you do, in what I do believe. And I couldn't tell why I have that belief either; it comes from a feeling of rightness within. And if you value your faith, if you love your god, accept that others love theirs just as much. Yours is not the only way, just as mine is is not.  Is acceptance of others my way?  Yes.  Do I own it?  No.  Do you need to do as I do and accept others?  Only if you wish to do unto others as you would have them do unto you.

*I have decided from this point on, such unequivocal and unwarranted invasion of my personal space and privacy (why is it any of your business?) will be met with in-kind: God no!  I don't want my attitude to degenerate into Hammurabi's Law because that's not the point of Doing Unto Others.  Spreading Hate is not going to make the world a better a place.  I do however feel it is perfectly within the boundaries of my personal space to shut them out as enthusiastically, when asked directly. You did ask.  Just because you won't like the answer doesn't mean I should be dishonest.

Bollywood mania

You've heard of Mister Toad, right?  He is Frog and Badger's friend and has manias that his friends have to save him from.  Like the Wild Ride.  I go through those too, large and small.  Sometimes a weekend passion to make-my-own-clothes-that-actually-fit-dammit.  Sometimes a song on replay for a couple of weeks. One Christmas I kept making Chex Mix for months afterward. Other times it's a tangential string of movies featuring a theme or actor.  Luckily, nobody has to save me.  I participate loosely, not acutely, in my manias.
And then there's the times they're more like distance learning classes, like taking an online course in something.  That's where I am now.  Hello Bollywood.
The interest started back somewhere with Bride and Prejudice.  It's Bollywood lite but still fits into the category.  Lite because of the American actors, mild dance numbers and lack of Hindi.  And it stemmed from another streak I was on, versions of Pride and Prejudice.  It translated so well from the austere English to an Indian spin that I ended up buying it.

But then--oh then!-- Bride and Prejudice came up on my Netflix queue and by association (IloveyouNetflix) I came across Bang Bang! and holy moly.  This, folks, is where the mania started. 
So now I'm on a Bollywood kick.  Which is weird.  Because the quintessential fact of a Bollywood film is the singing and dancing.  All of which I usually avoid.  Not a fan of musicals at all.  Can't stand them.  And yes, I saw Singing In The Rain.  The whole time I live in dread of the opening chords of another musical number.  They stop the plot.  And anything plot related that happens during a song is difficult to understand.  Unless the whole song is about it.  And then the whole song is about it.  I cringe and think, "Get on with it!" This isn't fair, I know.  And there are some musicals recently that I think I would probably enjoy.  What's the one with the guy who's constantly slamming doors and plays all of 7 seven people?  That one.  I bet I'd like that one pretty well.  Maybe I just need crazier action.  That could be the root of my distaste.  I also have not had the benefit of Broadway.  Midwestern musical theater is not bad--it can be quite good--but it's not handsome enough to tempt me.  My sensibilities are not that refined.  Give me more Bang Bang! for my buck, please.

This latest craze started out as a movie mania but it's impossible to just watch--literally I have to read the subtitles--which leads to picking up a few words. Then there's the costumes; costume analyzing is favorite pastime anyway.  See enough movies and you start being able to identify the stylistic differences between the actors. Salman Khan always has a gimmick: whistling and flexing, twitching his belt buckle, sticking his sunglasses in the back of his shirt collar.  Shah Ruhk Kahn likes personas reflected in costumes, later movies becoming more dramatic with the effects.  Hrithik Roshan is a rubberband; his signature is a fluid and highly choreographed dance style. (Indians are more concerned with directors, choreographers and lyricists.  My American habits keep me focused on the things I know, the actors I can identify.  If I care enough and the mania grips me long enough, I might get there.) 

It's Roshan who stars in Bang Bang!, along with Katrina Kaif, another name I've followed in my queue suggestions.  This was the best introduction I could have had to a genre of films I usually avoid.  To start with there are only 3 songs--3!--in the whole thing.  Plus the bonus song at the end which really is filmed more like MTV.  I can't tell if they further the plot; I don't speak Hindi.  Sometimes songs are subtitled, sometimes not.  But that's the crux--it's all good!!
And here's another thing I've learned: the movies are long.  3 hours sometimes.  But, there's often an Interval.  And that's pretty fun too.  Not the instrumental score you find in Lawrence of Arabia.  Well, maybe, I don't see them in Indian theaters.  But on my t.v. it's a well-timed cliff hanger.  In the case of Bang Bang! it's the cover to a romance novel.  And another kicker, you can't tell they're that long!  They don't feel like it.  The plot and action is spaced out enough and (usually) well knitted together so it doesn't feel like you are sitting through something interminable to get to the last, good 30 minutes. 
Probably the best thing and what I found most surprisingly refreshing is the complete lack of Western theological sensibility. I shouldn't have been surprised.  But somehow, the lack of that particular dogma snuck up on me.  And it's been fabulous to watch a consistently non-blonde cast.  With all the diversity of American cinema, there's a whole world out there, yo.
So it has begun.  If I can source my clothes from India my summer wardrobe is going to be awesome.

Soiled Undies or Suckling Pig

You know the old adage, always have on clean underwear in case you are in an accident.  For what? It's always a mother or grandmother in my head who says this.  Maybe that's who started it, some old wives.  Maybe it's a throw back from the 50's.  And would it really matter going in what they looked like?  For various reasons, they might not be clean post-accident, pre-medical attention.
I had a different kind of image run through my mind recently, maybe creating a new adage: Don't be a suckling pig!

I have an apple at my desk and I've been thinking, "Hey, I could eat that on the way home."  I normally bring a bottle of water to drink in the car--in my better moments--a nice way to stay hydrated with real liquid instead of caffeinated substitutes. I find I drink more if I have it in the car.  Driving is a miraculous way to do things by rote.  There's not enough to do apparently, having both hands on the wheel, using a turn signal, checking your blind spot.  Throw another little task in there.  For those times when you're just sitting there, bored.
I have the water.  But I could eat an apple too.  Like on the days when I forget to refill the bottle and bring it.  Or in corroboration with the water like some healthy commute coup.  The idea of  having something to do, to sing around, to fiddle with more than just the quick sip, was appealing.  Like I said, make it more complicated.  So I took the apple in the car with me and started eating at a stoplight.

And then I got to thinking, forget the underwear.  What happens if I have an accident and they find me with an apple stuffed in my mouth?  Like a roast pig?  Splayed out and maybe bruised, maybe a little crispy from frostbite, (being the time of year for it,) or from crash burns, giving me the overall coloring of something slightly cooked, apple in my mouth, like a suckling pig, eyes wide and staring.  What then?  What kind of picture would that make?  Much worse than soiled undies I think.  Soiled undies vs. suckling pig.  Hard to say.
If in your travels as a good Samaritan if you come across someone knocked out and looking ripe for the spit, know that you probably got the better of the two. And I thank you.