Garbage Removal: Part Two

Final: Part Two of Two


In a way I’m sad to note, my friend won the battle, for I’ve carried the memory of her fearful anger. I’ve seen fear’s glower too many times, on too many faces, not to recognize it now. It’s change that frightens—and so, angers—my friend. Any change, for any reason. A new time slot for a television show. A different treatment for preventing dental caries. Peace. Seat belt laws. Garbage removal.

I hold my breath for my friend. She is a good person. She works hard to make a safe home for her family. She puts in long, concentrated hours at her job. She is a faithful wife and loving mother; she is a stalwart friend. If only the world would stop for a while, she might find a way to be happy. If only technology would put on the brakes so she could catch up and get comfortable with all the new hardware and software. If only the nations of the world would announce total worldwide isolationism, so she could figure out who’s her friend and who’s not and why it’s changed so in the last few years…or hours. If only science would put a stop to research, so she could reconcile faith with fact, could get some sense of how plants and animals and planets and string theory and quantum mechanics can co-exist, much less depend on one another.

It won’t stop, of course. If we’re lucky. If we’re lucky, technology will continue to expand our avenues of knowledge, our opportunities for communication and connection in the global neighborhood. If we’re lucky, nations will continue new dialogues and relinquish old patterns of enmity. If we’re lucky, science will continue the search for healthy coexistence on this sweet planet.

And if we’re lucky, we will learn to embrace a new day even as we release the old one with gratitude for its truths and relinquishment of its fallacies.


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