I know a woman and her husband who I am thinking of and sending wishes for a holiday of peace and hope.

There is an insightful and well-done YouTube video of a commencement speech given by David Foster Wallace. He does a wonderful job of capturing elements of what I believe play a key role in being able to live a life that involves Random Acts of Kindness and sheds some light on my own RAK of today. It will be 9 minutes and 22 seconds of your life well invested. Trust me on this one.
This is Water https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DKYJVV7HuZw

BUT, be sure to scurry right back to my blog. Such fun things to discuss today…..

This morning I went to the grocery store early. One of Haley’s sisters from her other family is visiting and I wanted to pick up a few things before they woke up so I could demonstrate what a good father and host I am.  I was feeling rushed and jittery, and not adequately caffeinated for doing something as complicated as grocery shopping and being generally friendly to the other mammals I would undoubtedly encounter at the store.

The store was of course almost empty as it was stupid early, but because the store was almost empty there were only 2 check out lanes open. In front of me there was a young woman who appeared to have suffered a stroke with marked paralysis on her right side.  She was struggling with the payment system, which is set up for right-handed people (one of those things that must affect Lefties everyday of which we Righties are blissfully unaware.  Sorry, Haley!).  The clerk was doing an admirably gentle job trying to help her, but as English was not her first language, the transaction was experiencing some bumps.  Behind me was a couple who were bickering. Bickering, bickering, bickering in that special way that only married couples have mastered which has the calming effect to those in earshot of aluminum on the fillings in our teeth.  They were bickering about whether they had sufficient security software on their home computer.  She obviously did not care.  He obviously did not know what he was talking about. Neither really seemed to have their heart in it, but apparently bickering in public was on the to-do list and they might as well get it out of the way (Bickering in Public: Check!). There was something about how the young man who was bagging groceries moved, interacted and looked that suggested there was a medical, possibly psychological, diagnosis in there, but what it might be was not readily apparent.  For the record, in addition to being friendly and courteous, he was a monster grocery packing machine.  To round out the cast of characters, there is me; under-coffee-ed, anxious to be the “good host/father” so doing that dance people do when they really need to pee but someone else is in the bathroom.

Here we are; Young Stroke Woman, Bickering Couple, Middle-Aged English-Not-Her-First Language Cashier, Monster Grocery Packing Kid, and Pee-Pee Dance me. Such a great star-studded cast to be really, really annoying and frustrating (Coffee, damn it! I need coffee and you people are preventing that from happening!).   And then it struck me.  I don’t know why.  I don’t know how. Perhaps I had briefly acquired magically powers?  Perhaps it is a nasty side effect of repeated random acts of kindness?  But it struck me: This is a “moment.”  For this short space of time, our motley crew was crammed together in this life boat that is Lane 6 at the front of an almost empty grocery store.  What a weird group of Annoying Others who were complicating a task I was anxious to complete so I could be in a different moment than this one (I am sure they thought the same about me), who were also a group of fellow humans, bobbing along, maybe even floundering, in the currents of their streams. Somehow in my own bobbing and floundering, my rigid self-expectations of what it meant to be a good father and good host, my burning desire to be out of this store, my not wanting to leave the safety of my personal hamster ball and interact with these freaks, I was able to step back and recognize what a unique, odd and charming moment this was.

Here is what I did with this moment.  Using all my inadequately caffeinated willpower, I tried to hold my inner pee-pee dance self as still as possible and pretend I was calm and in no hurry.  I gave the young woman in front of me extra space so she would be less likely to feel rushed.  Although inside I was quivering like a chihuahua who has stolen my much needed coffee, when she cast a worried eye in my direction, I smiled back and tried to look relaxed and calm.  My turn to check out: I chatted with the cashier. When the manager had to join us because one of my items wouldn’t scan and she asked if I knew how much it cost, I suggested $10,000.  We all had a nice laugh (I am hilarious!) and they seemed relieved (apparently some customers get really unpleasant when something doesn’t scan. Who knew?).  We negotiated for the same amount as a similar item in my groceries.  I genuinely thanked the Grocery Packing Guy for what truly was an impressive packing job.  We wished each other happy holidays and the moment was gone.

The Bickering Couple?  At some point they decided to jump lines.  Unless you are someone who is blessed with good Line Karma, this is always a bad idea.  The line they jumped to came to a screeching  halt  and they were still in line when I left. Suckers.

SO what is the point?  (You: Since when do your blogs have a point?  Me: Sigh.)  I am not really sure what the point is (You: There’s the Erik we have come to know and love. Me: Sigh) but I know what it is not.  It is not that this was somehow some sort of amazingly special RAK, not something I am expecting a prize for (Although, Santa, if the sleigh’s not completely packed yet…).  I think the whole point is that it is not a dramatic moment, it is common everyday, often annoying, who-are-these-gross-people-blocking-me-from-getting-what-I-want-and-preventing-me-getting-out-of-here-so-I-can-just-get-on-with-my-day-and-try-to-take-care-of-all-the-shit-I-have-to-take-care-of-because-it-is-hard-to-be-me moment. White bread moments, easily ignored and so forgettable.  Small, stupid moments constructed of annoying and petty frustrations. The moments we all encounter every damn day, and, if we can somehow catch the edge and pull back the wrapping paper a bit, it is an opportunity to be something different than trivial and touch the world with our open hand.  This is water.

Maybe it matters. I don’t know. Maybe it doesn’t matter.  I don’t know.  I am just a gloriously complicated person filled with a ridiculous amount of contradictions scampering around my skull who is stumbling through a year of trying to do random acts of kindness.  Oh, in case you are thinking I am some sort of amazing zen-like guy who is so centered, I got really pissed off at the idiots who were the other drivers I encountered driving home.