Our Hybrid Lives

"I saw in the recitation, the beautiful recitation that was given to me, that God is with them whose garment was dusty and tattered.  My thoughts immediately went to the end of my garment; I examined and found that it is not dusty and it is not tattered; it is fairly spotless and clean.  God is not in me."  Speech at Government High School, Bangalore, 1915

I'm a recycler.  Yea, I put stuff in the can on the curb to avoid the dump, but I that's only a small, and I think insignificant, part. 

My mother's mother died thirty or more years ago.  My wife and I were recently married.  We were poor and had little furniture.  More than a bit of the furniture in my grandmother's home was shipped to us.  We still use most of what we received then in our current home.  Bookshelves, bed frames, a table, lamps, stuff I've forgotten belonged to her.  I cherish this stuff.

My desk and my desk chair were bought second hand.  I have my old desk, also bought second hand, in the garage.

I collect not just my old photos, but the old photos from my family and my wife's family.

I buy a lot of my clothes second hand.

We have used cars and furniture collected from family and friends.  We have old dishes and old mismatched silverware and pots and pans and serving platters collected from family.

It's not that I hate wasting stuff.  I do, but that's not it.

I know this will sound new agey.  Yuck...

But I love going to the old places in old cities.  I feel like I can feel all the people that have lived there.  It's not like I see ghosts or can feel 'old Mrs. Grundy's' spirit, but these places have an energy for me.  There's a heart beat, a soul in these places.

My tatters come second hand.  I choose tatters.  I don't earn tatters.

God is not in me.  But I have decided to choose God.

(Title from Chances Are by Sheryl Crow.  One of my favorite songs.)