February 5, 2022
I’m thinking a lot about the attribute of kindness this morning, chiefly because I spent half an hour yesterday in the company of someone who desperately needed it. And who radiated such thinly veiled anger it made it difficult to generate kindness in return.
He was a compact, bandy-legged man in his fifties, with sharp blue eyes and cropped white hair, and the straightest back I have ever seen. Flat as a board from back of neck to tailbone.
He’d come to repair a kitchen appliance and we chatted a bit as he worked, with increasing caution on my part when I realized how irritable he was. He had been borderline sarcastic on the phone when I set up the appointment, so I wasn’t blindsided by the in-person version.
I would’ve preferred a cheery chat with a knowledgeable repair guy—I always learn so much—but I’ve also learned to take people as they are and not as I wish them to be. I find life much less disappointing when I remember to have that attitude.
*****
As usual, it’s taken me a bit of time to discern the feelings beneath the prickliness, to remember that fear or hurt usually underlie the expression of anger, veiled or overt.
Other than belatedly sending him thoughts of peace and compassion, there isn’t much I can do for that man. I’m consciously gearing myself into a mode of kindliness this morning, and I attribute it to that experience yesterday. I find it difficult to feel appreciative toward uncomfortable catalysts, but at least I can remain neutral toward that particular prompt.
*****
I don’t have many interactions these days, so isolated encounters tend to stand out. This also means that my current laboratory of human experience on Earth is largely confined to self and family.
I have to confess I get a bit tired of the insularity. I want action! Activity outside the house! Travel and excitement!
I do have faith that such activities will occur, not months or years from now, but pretty soon. The global movement toward wresting our freedom from those who have been trying to control us gains momentum by the moment.
As encouraged by Freedom Convoy proponents, I’m sending love and high vibe energy and light toward all those who are active in the worldwide truck-and-other-vehicle convoys. The organizers note that one of the biggest contributions we can make is the profound yet simple act of noncompliance with illegal mandates wherever they affect us.
Don’t wear masks. Don’t get the jab. Don’t isolate at home. Simply do not go along with things that don’t mesh with your sovereign sense of what is right for you.
For me, it’s mostly about not wearing the mask…unless I absolutely have to. The most vehement non-compliers won’t wear a mask, period. My hat’s off to them! I’ve let myself off that particular hook for practical reasons, though, mostly because I want to maintain access to medical care, and I want to keep purchasing groceries and other necessities in-person at local stores.
Another way of looking at this is picking one’s battles carefully. The vaccine receives my unequivocal “no.” Masks…well, that depends.
*****
There’s another reason I won’t defiantly sail through the doorway of an establishment without the mask at least hooked over my ears. If I, who spend a tiny fraction of my time in places that demand masks, feel exasperated at having to wear one, how must the majority of employees feel?
I’m not big on predictions, but I think it’s safe to posit that it would require massive divine intervention to miraculously cure everyone’s PTSD from wearing mandatory masks for two years.
Either that, or counselors and psychologists and psychiatrists, in whatever form such services evolve to, are going to be booked up for years.
Do I truly want to create a scene in order to make the statement that I strongly disagree with having to wear masks?
I’d rather engage in stealth noncompliance by looping it over my ears and letting it sag down far enough so I can breathe through nose and / or mouth, and the employees can let it slide as well.
My life is tranquil compared to that of someone working an hourly job and being forced to wear a mask, and possibly forced to get the vaccine. I can’t in good conscience make that person‘s life even more difficult. They haven’t made the rules at their place of employment. It is not their fault that they are a cog in the wheel of the machine that’s attempting to crush humanity.
They’re just as much under that wheel as the rest of us.
*****
The militant among the non-compliers might dismiss this reasoning as mere excuse. From the black-and-white point of view, you must not comply at all, or you’re seen as giving up your sovereignty.
From the perspective of compassion, I consider my blip of mask-y compliance to be an act of kindness. I refrain from discomfiting fellow humans trapped at jobs where they aren’t allowed control over their own bodily autonomy.
Am I trying to justify capitulation to the mask mandate that’s been in place in California almost nonstop for two years? Taking the easy way out, as it were? Perhaps. But the Universe whispers, not so. And I perceive that I’m maintaining integrity in my own way, as others are doing within their own selves.
Besides, the Covid roadshow can’t play on forever. And when it’s over, I’ll welcome the blossoming of freedom as it sends tendrils and seedlings up from the warming earth. The freedom will embrace us all, whether we seemed to give in to the mandates a little, or a lot, or not at all. Like Love or an unstoppable river, freedom is indiscriminate in its reach.
