On my return from Latin America (via Ontario) to Vancouver, I found myself in the streets once again running into friends unexpectedly. Perhaps it was that, and the international couchsurfing that I've been doing that sponsored my latest epiphany. Like the Buddhas disciple, reformed, who upon presentation to the community as a reformed man was derided and shunned. (He was the murderer and maker of finger necklaces) it may take time before others realize anything has changed. Like Scrooge, (a name synonymous with miserliness) at the window shouting down on everyone the joy he felt. Are sympathies may not be appreciated. Peoples opinions arent quick to change. And in fact we might never influence the attitudes of their courts. The results of Scrooges window benedictions, might have been a "Fuck you Scrooge, you bastard!" middle finger raised high. I dont feel any sadness, that some locals arent happy, interested, amused, satisfied or pleased at my west coast return. Just a little amusement with this realization. Here is the quote from Thomas Merton, one of my favorite dead monks, that pretty much says it all... In Louisville, at the corner of Fourth and Walnut, in the center of the shopping district, I was suddenly overwhelmed with the realization that I loved all those people, that they were mine and I theirs, that we could not be alien to one another even though we were total strangers. It was like waking from a dream of separateness, of spurious self-isolation in a special world, the world of renunciation and supposed holiness. . . . This sense of liberation from an illusory difference was such a relief and such a joy to me that I almost laughed out loud. . . . I have the immense joy of being a member of a race in which God became incarnate. . . . There is no way of telling people that they are all walking around shining like the sun. Thomas Merton
