Eye-opening Trip Down Memory Lane

Coming home from the hospital where my dear friend had heart surgery today, I stopped at the local post office to buy stamps...you may remember stamps, they were once little cheap things we put on envelops when we wrote long letters to distant friends, paid bills or actually mailed out Christmas cards. Today, we use the internet more and more for all of the above mentioned correspondence. But today, I needed a real stamp to mail something....it's been a while. The long hot drive home from the medical center found me relieved to pull into our small hometown. I have long loved small town living.

Walking into the post office I was greeted by the familiar smell of post offices everywhere, no matter how big or how small, there is a distinguishable smell they have that can be found no where else. The cool air was refreshing and the hushed quiet felt reassuring, don't know why but it did. The hallway of mailbox faces lined the wall of the empty hall. I miss the brass plates that once adorned post office mailboxes, it's not the same when the detailed brass plates were replaced with the more economical and decidedly less attractive mailbox doors. Now they are just doors, no longer feel like locks to a treasure chest.

Maybe my kid-like fascination with post offices of days gone by was rather fanciful but I've always been enamored by them. I can remember being excited about going to the post office. We no longer live in a day and age where having your kid walk to town to check the mail is a good idea but we used to! I loved climbing the tall steps the old post office, the heavy glass doors the hushed stillness of the hallway that held the beautiful, magical brass-fronted mailboxes. I was also fascinated with the big poster of Uncle Sam pointing to you as you stood in front of it! Ah, and the metal stand with all the brochures from the different branches of the armed forces invited you to enlist and see the world. I always took one of each home with me because they ignited my imagination about foreign place I hoped to one day see. I miss those, too!

Today, I needed one stamp, so I entered the inner office of the post office where you buy stamps and/or send off packages. There were only two men to be seen, the professional though friendly postal worker behind the counter and a man in well-worn overalls talking about the merits of changing daylight savings time to winter months rather than the hot summer months where you work till nine, don't have dinner till eleven and then have to start all over again early the next day. I said, "Sir, I will vote for you for any office for which you choose to run based on that platform alone!" I, too, am not a fan of longer hot days! Never cared for daylight savings time, not any of my life. I prefer my days to be days and my nights to be night over daylight extended well into the night time hours.

He then moved on to discuss with some disdain the state of our country under our current leadership. Terse words about terrorist, birth certificates, et cetera were tossed over his shoulder as he left the glassed in inner office. I commented to the postal worker that he must hear all sorts of commentaries. He said he heard all sorts of things every day. This man, he said, had just lost his combine; he just lost everything and it was so hard to be a farmer in this economy. My heart was heavily burdened for the farmer than just walked out the door. I do not know him, do not know if I would recognize him if I saw him again but  my heart hurt for him. We have a lot of farmers in this area and, sadly, I must say, I have not given them a lot of thought. But this day, I felt a heavy weight of knowing my fellow small-towner, a farmer, my neighbor has lost his entire livelihood. This hurt me through and through. 

Friends, we are all connected, all people. Small town, large cities, third world countries, remote islanders, famous and infamous, rich and poor, educated and illiterate...we are all connected. Sometimes we get so absorbed in our own little worlds and illusion of importance that we never give a thought to "those people" that do not hit our radar. Today, I felt conviction in my spirit for the blind eye with which I viewed my world. How can we say we seek to be more Christ- like if we do not have the heart and vision for all people Christ displayed over and over? God has a world vision, not tunnel vision. As one with a call to be a missionary, I have had a heart for lost people....somehow that world vision has narrowed and I've stopped thinking in world vision terms. For this I asked forgiveness. My prayer is that we purpose to open our eyes to all people. To feel their pain, share their joy, empathize with their issues, show compassion to those where needed and most importantly of all, do this in the name of Jesus!

My nostalgic memories of trips to the post office and my need for one little stamp was, I believe, a divine appointment to show me where I had lapsed into apathy where empathy would be more Christ-like. I always say I wish I got postcards from heaven....today it as a message in a post office...isn't that just like God?!