Tuesday, March 23, 2010

Watch Yourself Go By

Watch Yourself Go By

By: Strickland Gillilan

Just stand aside and watch yourself go by;
Think of yourself as “he” instead of “I.”
Note, closely as in other men you note
The bag-kneed trousers and the seedy coat.
Pick flaws; find fault; forget the man is you,
And strive to make your estimate ring true.
Confront yourself and look you in the eye-
Just stand aside and watch yourself go by.
Interpret all your motives just as though
You looked on one whose aims you did not know.
Let undisguised contempt surge through you when
You see you shirk, O commonest of men!
Despise your cowardice; condemn whate’er
You note of falseness in you anywhere.
Defend not one defect that shames your eye-
Just stand aside and watch yourself go by.
And then, with eyes unveiled to what you loathe,
To sins that with sweet charity you’d clothe,
Back to your self-walled tenement you’ll go
With tolerance for all who dwell below.
The faults of others then will dwarf and shrink,
Love’s chain grows stronger by one mighty link,
When you, with “he” as substituted for “I,”
Have stood aside and watched yourself go by.

Monday, March 22, 2010

Sidewalk Supremacy

Last week my family and I went to Southern California for a vacation. Of course, it included a day at Disneyland and several walks at the beach. As you know, I am a noticer of wierd things. One of the things I notice is sidewalk etiquette. And when it comes to sidewalk etiquette, there is a dearth of it. Whether I am walking at Lake Hefner here in OKC, on the rim of the Grand Canyon, or on the boardwalk at Laguna Beach, it seems that every group that is walking toward me has already decided that I am in their way and therefore I must yield the sidewalk to them. Groups of three or four feel perfectly empowered to walk abreast, sauntering without any realization that anyone else might possibly need some of the sidewalk for their own journey.
I am reminded of a playground game that many of the boys would play at recess. They would assemble 10 or 12 boys, lock arms and march the length of the playground saying, "We won't stop for a bottle of pop!" over and over as they mowed down smaller kids like me, or forced us to run to the end of the relentlessly moving barricade to get around them. All those feelings of powerlessness and resentment come flooding back every time Carole and I find it necessary to go single file or even step off the sidewalk so that the meandering sidewalk bullies are allowed to continue unhindered down the sidewalk they seemingly own.
I have wondered what it would be like to pretend that I am oblivious of the others and play a slow motion game of sidewalk "chicken". Would one of us suddenly lose our nerve and jump off the path, or would we come to a halt, facing one another, waiting for the other one to yield?
I try to spiritualize this mini-drama by remembering the scriptural admonition to "esteem others more highly than yourself", but I still get frustrated that others aren't as spiritual as I. Don't they want blessings in their lives? No, they are just settling for sidewalk supremacy.
I think about monumental things, don't I?

Monday, March 1, 2010

DPS Salvation

Today was the day I had to go to the Department of Public Safety to get my driver's license renewed. Since I have a commercial license, I have to go through this renewal process before I can go to a tag agent and get my new license. The process was very egalitarian. If you want fair, this was fair. It was tough and impersonal for all. When you came in the door, you stopped at a table and stated your business to a lady who didn't care if you stayed or left, as long as you followed the rules. The rules were the same for everyone. Show two forms of ID, fill out the short form, take a number, return the clipboard, and sit down while waiting for your number to come up. My number was 417 and they were calling for 389 as I sat down. After an hour and a half I completed the seven minute renewal procedure and left with a sheet of paper that entitles me to go to the tag office tomorrow and get my new license. There were people from many different ethnic origins, from all age groups, and all over the economic scale. No one was treated any better or worse than anyone else. I came directly after attending a funeral so I still had on a jacket and tie, but I was given no more consideration that the guy with his "pants on the ground." And I hated it. I have to admit that I have grown used to getting some preferential treatment in most areas. In restaraunts, golf courses and doctor's offices, my nice appearance and seeming affluence has helped expedite matters for me on more than one occasion. It was somewhat deflating not to join in "the look" at the slobs who don't know how to conduct themselves in public while being escorted past them to a preferential place.

It came to me as I sat next to a couple of young people with funny colored hair and multiple piercings who were making out in the chairs next to mine that I was being viewed much as God views me (aside from the part where He loves me unconditionally). He is no respecter of persons. The outside means very little to Him. He looks on the heart. I can't see the heart. I can only see externals. The lady at the front table saw only people to be processed. She didn't care what I looked like or if English was my first language or not. She let me know what I had to do to get my license renewed: I had to believe that I was at the place I had to be to get renewed, have my identification ready and the willingness to wait until the process completed. Nothing else was important.

I used to think that going to the Department of Public Safety was a glimpse of hell. It might be a glimpse of salvation.