I Wish I Wasn't So Selfish

I wish I wasn't so selfish. No, I don't wish to be a shellfish, nor will I sell fish, but I wish I wasn't so selfish. This story involves an elderly woman, immense sadness, and a rejuvenated joy. Get to the point already? Sure, here goes.

I nearly didn't write this post because I was afraid it'd come off sounding like I was a high school dramatist wearing black clothes that are too hot for Florida weather, all while drinking McDonald's coffee, frowning at my choice of this drink over always-reliable Coke, wishing there really were Starbuck's restaurants everywhere like in the movies or post-modern novels.

The other day I was working and doing what I could to put gas in our two vehicles, mocha frappuccinos in our bellies, and diapers over Eli's butt. Something drew my attention to two women who were silently and gleefully shopping for what appeared to be nothing out of the ordinary. There she was, the most depressing and horribly sad expression for a human being that had passed my vision in never-too-long. I say never-too-long because there's no amount of time that needed to be counted in this sort of occasion.

This woman, this...creature that God had made with His precious hands...she nearly toppled me and crushed my kneecaps with her appearance. I don't get this-I didn't understand what about her dropped me as happened, but there she was. Elderly describes her age, but what of her other features...her hair billowed, like an alto-cumulus cloud that has gone white in fright of lightning. Her glasses were homely, strangely perfect for her face...nothing else could fit her as these glasses did. This woman's skin drooped slightly, gravity winning its hold on her years. The mouth: small, quaint, really, home to warm air that breathed slowly, yet always ready to speed up in case of trouble. Then there was her posture. She slumped as most older people do, but the crescent that made her back won't leave my mind's eye. She held on to the shopping cart as if her entire life has climaxed into never letting go.

I have saved her eyes for last for my heart needed time to prepare to recall all that I remember. There's no logic to my memory of what this woman looked like, but the eyes...those starry and innocent eyes. What is it about the eyes that crush me like a can under a tire?! One eye of this incredibly sobering woman was lower than the other, but only because the eyelid of her right eye lost its fight to gravity far before the left. Instead of porcelain or maybe off-white, her lower lid allowed the redness within her eye to come out, showing what most people would selfishly think to be gross or in need of medical attention.

There's not a lot that I fully grasp in life. I have a hard time comprehending friendship, love, hate, and patience. I don't quite get life as it opens before me. For some reason, I do understand this woman's beauty. My flesh says she's unlovable and not pretty in any sense of the word. My soul-my very spirit driven by God-calls to her in a hands-out kind of way saying, "You ARE beautiful! You are the innocence I thought was gone forever."

As all these descriptions and thoughts harshly flooded my brain and heart, she was gone, as quiet as she came. Before I lost her forever, this old woman floated along behind her lifeline, the shopping cart, shyly making her way through my world as wall flowers usually do. Her pressed lips were so tiny, but I distinctly heard her say to me and only me, "Don't let them see me this way."

Oh God! This is true, I understand it now. This is how You look at me. Well, before your Son took me by the hand with me saying, "Please, don't let them see me this way."