It was a Thursday in July a few years ago. I was sitting in an airport waiting to hop on a plane and head home after a long business trip. The weather was good. I had been worrying about it disrupting my flight plans, but the skies were mainly blue with only the occasional cloud dotting the horizon. The plane was sitting on the tarmac; the gate agent had keyed the mike and started the boarding process by inviting those that might need special assistance or a little extra time in boarding. In was in that moment, a lady walked up who at first glance appeared to be holding a small baby – one of those little extra time people. “I think it’s my turn” the lady said with more cheer and happiness than should be physically possible in an airport. Naturally, I found this a bit odd. I happened to be standing over by a window in the gate area, so from my vantage point I watched this lady make her way over to the turboprop which was to be our ride home. I couldn’t help but notice she was carrying this baby a little carelessly and I worried she might drop the child before she made it to the plane. Thankfully, she and her baby made it safely and I forgot all about her for the next few moments.
It wasn’t very long afterwards when I got on the plane myself, ready to sit down and perhaps catch a quick nap inevitably brought on by the drone of the engines. However, much to my dismay, my potential nap was cut off by this loud, enthusiastic chit chat going on a couple rows behind me. For those that travel, you know what I am talking about, don’t you. I have nothing against people making conversation, but there are those times when I really wish they would keep it down a bit. I guess that’s why we have those noise canceling headphones. I remember thinking I needed to get a pair.
Perhaps it was fortunate I didn’t have any headphones, because it was in the next few moments I started piecing things together. You see, all the chit chat was coming from the lady – the one who boarded the plane first with her baby. She was loud, but she was excited to be heading home. She was also dying to share her experiences of the past week with those sitting beside her. Hearing this conversation opened my eyes to something that I had somehow missed earlier. You see, what I finally realized was the fact it wasn’t a baby this lady had been carrying when she boarded the plane. It was a baby doll.
Now there I was thinking to myself: Isn’t it simply amazing – no downright shocking – what some people will do just to board the plane first? I mean we all want to be first, but by golly, you are supposed to earn the privilege, not take it by fraud!
In case you are wondering if I have lost my mind, let me just clarify: I’m joking to help lighten the moment. Really. I didn’t have those thoughts about the lady. The truth is if you were in my shoes, you would never have thought the baby doll was part of this complex plan to fool the airline into allowing her to board the plane first. You see, as I sank down in my seat, said a quick hello to my neighbor and attempted to lose myself in a book (that also seems to help bring on a nap), I could easily overhear this lady speaking with her neighbors. And as I listened to her speak and tell everyone around her what she had been doing during the week, I realized this lady sounded more like my five year old daughter than a twenty something year old. In other words, I guess this lady had what society would call “a disability”.
The more I listened to her, though, and as the plane ride gave me time for a little reflection, I realized there was a major problem with the “disability” label. You see, when she spoke you were confronted with the fact her voice was filled with nothing but joy and excitement. It was the kind of joy and excitement that wasn’t suppressed with worry about tomorrow or the regrets of yesterdays. I describe it to you and I am not sure that I really am able to understand it fully to be perfectly frank. You see, I wonder if it is even possible for me to experience with total strangers what this lady demonstrated with such ease and grace.
And it occurs to me I have used the term “stranger” here, but it was obvious this lady wouldn’t understand the term. Each and every person she came in contact with was met with a spirit of a child, this sense of innocence and trust. Jesus talked about this type of spirit, but up until that point, I am not sure I had a real, good grasp of what it looked like.
But, while it’s relatively easy to focus on what was present in her spirit, I think it is just as important to point out what was missing, because it was what made her so unique. I bring up this point because it led me to consider what life would be like if I could somehow be like her. Simply put, I wondered if I could be like this lady and live my life completely free of all judgment. She spent no time trying to size someone up as she met them for the first time. She wasn’t distracted with the burden of trying to figure out someone’s agenda or analyze a random comment from a conversation in an effort to figure out if she had been slighted in any way.
How do I know this about her? Honestly, you could hear it in her voice. It was obvious she did not waste any energy on what people thought of her. I am certain this idea would be a completely foreign concept to her and it would be to the rest of us as well if we could free our minds of this tendency to judge others. I don’t want to sound preachy in saying this, because in a world tarnished with sin, in a world driven by capitalism and competition, we are asked to judge all the time. Is that person being honest? Is this opportunity I am being presented legitimate? Is this person on the phone really trying to help someone out or is this just a scam to make a buck? The world is a tough place. We must judge. Even so, to witness this lady living a life carefree and absent of judgment was to see a life free of worry and doubt, a life that was best characterized as pure, unblemished beauty and joy.
Real beauty, real joy. We all know what it is, I believe. The knowledge is there inside each of us. It’s intuitive. We are almost hardwired to know what this particular type of beauty and joy is and yet to experience it is so rare, isn’t it? Sometimes, though, I wonder if I am off base here. In my doubts I sometimes ask myself if I am reading more into this than there actually was. Somehow, my heart tells me no. The world is a tough place and in this struggle to make it day by day, it’s so easy for the real meaning of joy and beauty to get lost. But in my better moments, I know beyond a shadow of a doubt, it is there and it is within the reach of each of us to grasp if only we can get beyond the obstacles in our hearts and in our minds. I saw it, I felt it and I heard it that day as I witnessed this lady embrace the world and the people around her.
So, let me give you one more picture from this story before I close. As I was leaving the flight and heading into the terminal to complete the journey home, this lady was getting a ride on a cart driven by one of the airport service personnel. And as she drifted out of earshot, I could hear her insistent
ly questioning the gentleman driving the cart: “Where did all my friends go?”, she asked. “Where are my friends?”
I guess the response of the world would be to say: Friends? How silly and naïve. But I have to confess to you hearing that plea from her shook me up a bit. I tell you this story in part so that I won’t forget it, but also because I think I learned a lot from her that day. I think she taught me something Jesus spoke about to his disciples. I think it had a lot to do with freedom – freedom from this incessant need to judge others, freedom from the sometimes debilitating worry we experience every day – worry about work, schedules, responsibilities, time, appearance, acceptance from others – the list goes on and on and on.
You know how it goes:
“Oh, I need to be at this place by 3 and I hope the traffic or the weather doesn’t get in my way because if it does my plan will be completely wrecked. And then, if I miss this appointment, what will these people think of me? Well, they’ll probably think I’m lazy and undependable, because I’ve seen those types of people and I would never give somebody like that a second chance.” Okay. Maybe I’ve gone too far and it’s just me, but my guess is that something like this happens to everyone at one point or another.
And yet, Jesus talks about a life much different than that. In the book of Matthew, he talks about a life that is free from worry and doubt and the fear that accompanies it. Christ talks about looking to the birds of the air. He says they never worry about what to eat because the Fathe
r in Heaven provides. Simply put, without the chains of worry and doubt, they are free to soar and simply be – that is – be the very thing God created them to be. They may not understand the physics behind their ability to fly or the weather pattern that may disrupt their food source. But, they fly, nonetheless, with nothing in the way of simply allowing the wind to pick them up and
take them to new heights and new places. Allowing the wind to carry them to all parts of God’s creation on a journey of discovery called life – again, living as God made them to live.
As I look back on that moment and reflect on who the lady was and how she was living her life while we shared a plane ride home, I often wonder: who had the disability? Was it her or was it me? Who was free and who was chained by stress and worry or some secular measurement of mental capacity. And what good is all this mental capacity if it’s consumed by worry and doubt, which ultimately robs us of our opportunity to experience, wonder, joy, excitement, discover, freedom? This beautiful lady reminded me of something I knew to be true, but rarely recall: Life is a gift and it’s ours to do with whatever we please. Thanks to her, I now ask myself: what if every day of my life brought a new wonder, a new discovery, a fresh sense of joy and excitement, a new friend? I’d take it. It would be pretty cool.
Picture by: Ruby Fullenwider