This morning we drove by a goose. That’s not so unusual here in Maine. What was unusual was that it was standing in a muddy puddle, a puddle that was about six feet away from a beautiful clear pond.
We wondered why. Did it not see the pond? Did it prefer the muddy puddle for some reason unseen to us, flying by in our car? Was it just ornery?
We will, of course, never know. Geese are notorious for not sharing their motives with humans, -- but I still wonder.
Sometimes I, too, feel like I’m standing in a muddy puddle. Feeling like that’s all there is. "Better this than nothing," I might tell myself.
Possibly, but what if there's a wonderful clear pond right behind me, -- I just haven’t turned around.
It brings to mind one of my favorite Bible stories. It’s in the Old Testament and tells of a woman, Hagar, who has been banished to the desert and is about to watch her only child, Ishmael, die of thirst. (She's also about to die of dehydration, of course, but that's never mentioned). All this because the boy’s father, Abraham, wants to please his other wife, Sarah, who is jealous of Ishmael and Hagar.
What a mess. A hopeless, tragic, unfair mess, with no way out.
But Hagar prays and, as she does, she hears the voice of God. It tells her to look just there, under that bush (or some such). She does and finds a well! A well that had been there all along. A well she never saw and would have died right next to had she not listened to that inner voice.
As I think about this, the goose, Hagar and her well, for some reason I recall an article I read years ago by author Robert Fulghum. In it he asked his Greek philosophy professor:
“Dr. Papaderos, what is the meaning of life?”
The usual laughter followed, and people stirred to go. Our teacher held up his hand and stilled the room and looked at me for a long time, asking with his eyes if I was serious and seeing from my eyes that I was.
“I will answer your question.”
Taking his wallet out of his hip pocket, he fished into a leather billfold and brought out a very small round mirror, about the size of a quarter. And what he said went like this:
“When I was a small child, during the war, we were very poor and we lived in a remote village. One day, on the road, I found the broken pieces of a mirror. A German motorcycle had been wrecked in that place. I tried to find all the pieces and put them together, but it was not possible, so I kept only the largest piece. This one, and by scratching it on a stone, I made it round. I began to play with it as a toy and became fascinated by the fact that I could reflect light into dark places where the sun would never shine—in deep holes and crevices and dark closets.
As I became a man, I grew to understand that this was not just a child’s game but a metaphor for what I might do with my life. I came to understand that I am not the light or the source of light. But light—truth, understanding, knowledge—is there, and it will shine in many dark places only if I reflect it.
I am a fragment of a mirror whose whole design and shape I do not know. Nevertheless, with what I have I can reflect light into the dark places of this world—into the black places in the hearts of men—and try to change some things. Perhaps others may see and do likewise. This is what I am about. This is the meaning of my life.”
