Ed, my neighbour next door, is still in high gear at his farm. Even with most of his crops combined, Ed assures me he has enough work for 40 men to do. He voiced his opinion that as a good neighbour I could come out and give him a hand at his farm. Of course, I had to tell him then the other 39 would have nothing to do. I did say I'd be glad to help him at his farm if he would help in my garden.
One thing Ed despises is a garden. A potato on his plate is fine, but when it is in the ground in the garden he no longer has an appetite for it. Hunting with a rifle is a great sport for Ed, but hunting for weeds with a hoe is worse than wearing a suit that fits like a straightjacket and sitting through a long funeral. Worst of all, is when the really long funeral is for of a chump of a cousin Ed couldn't stand in life or even in death. For Ed, a garden is about as bad as it gets - that is, if he has to help in one.
"If I helped you in your garden, we would have it done in ten minutes and then you would be bored with nothing to do. You retired guys make a big deal out nothing. You wander around all day combing your bald heads and picking your false teeth," Ed informed me.
Ed's aversion to gardens is also carried over to seniors. A senior is somewhere between a demanding child and an old dog who gets in your way. Ed tends to avoid seniors if he can, and for me as a senior next door, I am like a pesky fly you cannot get rid of but you know will die off eventually.
It is difficult, almost right at impossible, for Ed and all of us to be humble. Who of us are humble enough to consider others better than ourselves as the Bible instructs us?
We all have those other people we just don't see as counting. Sometimes at work, I know some people see me, a greeter, as a worthless old geezer who is paid to stand around and say hello and goodbye to people who just want to be left alone.
I showed Ed a book I'm reading about two young guys who lived in six different American cities to see what it feels like to be homeless. They spent five months experiencing the reality of hunger, danger, exhaustion, depression and the rejection of people not homeless. They brushed elbows with alcoholics and drug dealers while eating from garbage dumpsters. They did it to empty themselves of their conceited attitudes toward those living on the streets. Their book, Under the Overpass, has a long-haired young man on the front cover. Ed's response was "What a waste of time, but what do you expect if he doesn't know enough to get a haircut."
Many of us do not want to acknowledge that every community has its poor, hungry and homeless. Perhaps, too many of us when faced with street people in person, look the other way. We are content to let them alone in their hunger and hard situation. How many of us see them as having equal worth with ourselves? Do we consider them better than ourselves? Maybe we should begin to do so.
