Like most people, my head if full of a lot of stuff. Stuff being old memories, new ideas, to-do lists, and various other thoughts and feelings. I relate the stuff in my head to the fizz in soda bottle. My brain is constantly bubbling, and sometimes some random thing will surface again and again so that I'm forced to think about it, sort it out, deal with it, make meaning from it and whatnot.
Here's the thing that's been on my mind the last few days:
(it's sort of a long story so bear with me...)
When I was in college I had to drive through a rather shady part of town to get to school from home and vice versa. Whenever I would drive through this part of town I'd always make sure my doors were locked, and I'd become acutely aware of my surroundings, the way you're supposed to do when you're in a shady neighborhood. The people in this neighborhood are not like me and I'm afraid of them because they all want to rob me and carjack me and do all sorts of terrible things to me because I'm one of the "haves" and this neighborhood is full of the "have nots". Yada yada yada.
Anyway, on this particular day I'm remembering it was raining, or had been raining. I got stopped at a traffic light. As I'm looking around my car making sure all my doors are locked, and checking my surroundings for shady people, I notice the lady in the car next to me is trying to get my attention. I look at her, this lady from the shady neighborhood who I have nothing in common with, and I notice she's pointing at something. She's pointing to something to my right. I look over to see that she's showing me a rainbow. She's pointing to a big, beautiful rainbow. This lady, who a minute before I probably wouldn't have liked, or I might have even been afraid of her, took the time to show me a rainbow. We shared a moment. It made me happy, so I smiled at her.
Whenever I think about this story, it always makes me feel good. I imagine that no matter how different people may be, that we might have more in common than we think. Even if it is only that we all like rainbows.
