Keeping Our Center ~ Day 99

Robert Fulghum tells a great story about when he was twenty-two and working as a night clerk at a lodge in the Sierra Nevada Mountains of northern California. One week the staff had been served the exact same thing for lunch every day: hot dogs and sauerkraut. To top it off, the cost of the meal was deducted from their meager paychecks.

Well, Friday night rolled around and Robert went into the kitchen to get a bite to eat when he discovered a note to the chef that said that hot dogs and sauerkraut would be on the employee menu two more days. Lacking much of an audience at 11 p.m., Robert found Sigmund Wollman, the night auditor, and went into a twenty minute rant. He’d had it, he was quitting, he was going to throw a plate of hot dogs and sauerkraut at the owner! This was un-American, the resort sucked and the guests were all idiots, etc. etc. Plus it was punctuated by the kicking of chairs, pounding of tables and much profanity.

Sigmund (a survivor of Auschwitz, by the way) sat quietly through it all smoking a cigarette. When Robert wound down, he said, "Fulchum, you think you know everything, but you don't know the difference between an inconvenience and a problem. If you break your neck, if you have nothing to eat, if your house is on fire--then you got a problem. Everything else is inconvenience. Life is inconvenient. Life is lumpy. Learn to separate the inconveniences from the real problems. You will live longer. And will not annoy people like me so much. Good night."

This seems like good advice during this crazy pandemic. Not being able to eat in a restaurant, not going in public without a mask, not going to church, or the movies, or State Fair, or a concert, or a sporting event… these are all inconveniences. Keeping our center means learning to get some perspective, and not letting our energy and joy get sucked up by inconveniences.

When stressed out, frustrated, or getting angry, perhaps it’s time to ask ourselves, “Problem or inconvenience?”

Love & Light!

Kaye