April 5: Rolling Year, Wise Men, Keeping Focused

"At this time of the rolling year," the spectre said, "I suffer most.  Why did I walk through crowds of fellow beings with eyes turned down, and never raise them to that blessed Star which led the Wise Men to a poor abode!  Were there no poor homes to which its light would have conducted me!"

The spectre in question is Jacob Marley, and, in this passage,  he is lamenting his eternal fate of wandering through the world, witnessing its needs and sufferings.  Marley is a victim of his own trivial concerns and selfishness.  Just like Scrooge.  Just like most of us.

I know, when I woke up this morning, my first thought wasn't about poverty or famine.  My first thought was more like, "I am so freakin' tired.  I wish I could just go back to bed and skip work."  Very rarely do I contemplate how lucky/blessed I really am to have jobs to go to, breakfast to eat, hot water to shower with.  No, I pretty much go through my life with blinders on, thinking about the things I don't have.  In some ways, it's a lot easier to be unsatisfied with life.  Think about it.  It's much easier to be envious of a person (of his job, her car, his home, her family, his this, her that) than to be happy with your job or home or car.  Gratitude is difficult to cultivate.

Modern society and culture foster an attitude of want.  I just got an iPad 2 for Christmas.  Apple just released the next generation iPad last month, and it's selling like crazy.  It's the newest "something better" every person wants.  I want a full-time teaching job at the university.  I want a bigger house.  I want to write a bestselling book.  (I wanted to win the lottery last Friday.)  We all suffer the same affliction as Marley--walking through life with our eyes down, focused only on our path.  Our journey.

I don't often think of the bigger picture.  For instance, I don't think of my neighbors across the street very much.  They're an elderly couple.  The husband is very ill.  I haven't seen him out much at all this winter.  The last time I said anything to his wife was last fall.  I had a box of blueberry doughnuts left over from a church function.  I gave them to the wife, mainly because I didn't want the temptation in my house.  The wife was thrilled with the pastry.  She kept saying, "Are you sure you don't want these?  Are you sure?"  It was a tiny gesture, made more out of selfishness (wanting to watch my weight) than anything else.  Yet, it made a difference in that couple's lives.

For a couple minutes, my eyes weren't focused down.  They were focused upward, toward that Star.

For a couple of minutes, Saint Marty was a wise man.

Just as good as gold, frankincense, or myrrh