Humanness

People are experiential. In the same way that we buy tickets for the experience of hearing someone sing in a concert or dance on a stage, every person we encounter, each child of God, we experience them, as they pack up our groceries or sit next to us at the taco place or sweat it out on the mat next to us. We feel them, we feel them as energy, we feel when someone is afraid or angry or frustrated. We can feel their joy too, their hopefulness, their bright company. And we say, "I feel you," when we look each other in the eye.

This is most true when it's someone that we love. It is not the clothes they wear or even the things that they say, but rather how they move through the house, how they open a window, their footsteps in the hall. It's how they smell and how they hum in the shower and how their body brings warmth. God did this perfectly, this communion of the spirit, that fills the empty spaces.

There is no fame or fortune or far away land or drink that soothes the soul nearly as well, as the hand of someone who loves you on your back.

People are God's greatest gift to us, over every sunset, over every mountain range and river bend. It's the miracle of flesh and blood. With each new born baby, the Heaven's rejoice and trumpets sound. Sometimes we forget about this, when those babies grow up and cut us off on the highway or become annoying neighbors. And it is so disorienting when those babies grow up and do evil things.

But even still, the endless value of humanness does not change. And what each person brings is so intricately created and unique. How is it possible that there are no two fingerprints alike?

So I think the goal here, at least as I see it, is to try and be gracious when that newborn baby cuts me off or plays their music too loud. And then to carve out the time, hand the doorman my ticket, sit quietly in the theater, whether that be home or grocery store or taco place, and as the curtains open, silence my cellphone, look up and see... as the people in front of me... sing and dance...miracles that they are.