Sprouting Seeds of Community 9-4-9

Cater’s Lake, Anderson, South Carolina

The first hints of autumn crispness were in the air at sunrise, providing a renewed enthusiasm for life. A cerulean sky filled with mottled tuffs of cotton candy provided a fine easel for the emerging sunrise. Even the basset hound on Fenwall Road was liberated from his August torpor and showed more enthusiasm in his sonorous bark as I passed by.

The men on the roof I saw the past several days were most enthusiastic in their greetings to me. Today we even exchanged words - good words. I was now a ‘regular’ in their lives, riding by their job site each day, as they worked at their craft. They were nearly finished with their job and were happy with the fine autumnal morning and a project well done. A desultory house with its moldy stained roof was now fresh and renewed. Their little ascendant community had included me this week as I rode.

Could it be? Were those two women back in the park again with their folding chairs set up in a safe space between their two cars? Yes! Would I get a bit more of a greeting this time? Would they realize I really wanted their park to feel friendly and safe? For several days I have ‘worked’ at conveying this message. Today I took a chance and offered a forthright salutation, not a skittish tentative one like I have done previously. Today one of these women was actually enthusiastic and responded with a fine smile and greeting. Her friend ventured forth with a tentative smile of her own and even a verbal response with some animation. I am on a roll now.

I could not have been thirty feet from their little safe haven when I came upon a woman and her mother walking their fine white Highland Terriers. Both of these women erupted into vociferous greeting. One immediately congratulated me on my good fortune. Yesterday between bids, the women in her bridge club had been talking about my winning a free rip around the world. I guess it is not everyday someone in this small town wins the world. They were elated for me. Their enthusiasm was a grand generous gift.

Lucy lost her elegant and very cultured father some years ago. Lucy’s mother lost as fine a husband as a woman could ever hope to find. Standing there with their terriers, they reminded me of a splendid encounter I had years ago with this gentleman, a very short time before he died. This dear man had once shared a hospitality and gracious community with me in the park that has not faded from my memory over the years. Arthur certainly would have done very well in the state department as a diplomatic officer.

That encounter, that seed of community, was so powerful for me; it compelled me to write an essay about it that has circulated locally. I am told that essay about Arthur was most helpful to his family when the time came to let him go to the next life. Today they spoke of what became an unwitting eulogy I had written to this man so dear in their lives. It was a most affirming speck of community for me to have today in the park at sunrise. At least twice I have had, as GK Chesterton would have said, flecks of paradise wash up on the shores of my life through this family. Both times in the park.

Most importantly, two women, complete strangers, sitting in their folding chairs in their little sanctuary between their cars, were within ear shot. They were able to see us share a sacred space of community; celebrate our good fortunes, even reminisce about people once so profoundly important in our lives. Perhaps these strangers will get the all important message that true safety comes from community and not from their glass and steel get-away vehicles. I almost feel like bringing flowers on my next ride. I might actually get away with it.

In my front garden is a stand of hundreds of black eyed Susan’s. These happy bright yellow flowers create a most welcoming, almost whimsical ambience. Years ago I bought exactly two of these plants, not knowing they spawn thousands of seeds that so easily germinate and sprout the following year. These have to be the ultimate, low maintenance high yield perennials in existence, even better than dandelion. For no additional investment I have hundreds of plants, each full of seeds containing a universe of spectral delights.

It occurs to me that seeds of community are much like those in my yard. Even the smallest amount of effort can result in colorful flecks of paradise washing up on the shores of our souls, year after year. We know we have a good crop when we see these colorful blooms washing up in the souls of those around us, even those sitting in folding metal chairs.

Now I just need to figure out how to market these seeds. Their yield is phenomenal and the return on investment spectacular. One day the whole world can be a garden.