Life Divide

Blog18:

Whether our mingling with people is brought upon by purpose or chance, the meeting leaves a momentary or lingering thought.  At times, such a thought takes on a form that haunts or shocks.  Other times, it awes.  Still in some distant part of our mind, a thought weaves about and searches an answer to a how or why.

Such a mingling yesterday I had with like travelers at a public restaurant took a wondering path.  The mild chatter within and among voices in the room was distinct, but it might as well have been obscured … hidden.  All who came in to partake of a meal were welcomed and seated.  All were invited to feast, and after choosing what one’s stomach and palate appears to have wanted from an array of common and uncommon dishes, and then served just what’s asked for, in turn entered an independent and compartmentalized enjoyment of taste-filling adventure.  Nothing else mattered, I observed, beyond the sampling after sampling of what’s on the plate.  And when food devouring, instantly, or slowly ended, leave taking took a turn in disciplined, civilized fashion. 

“Funny strange,” I thought.  “Why didn’t the meal partakers stay a while to mingle with those who welcomed them in?” I wondered, and kept wondering in between sips of tea. 

Something very real comes out alive from this musing.  At this fine food establishment, within this resort playground for travelers with life resources to dispense at whim, there breathes opposing rhythms.  In it the “haves and the have nots” mingle and accept one another in silent deference, or simply shrug off the reality of differences that exist between them.  The working group moves in and out of travelers lives; they move in a cycle of welcome and service over and again.  They are the cooks, the wait staff, the ground and pool keepers, room and building maintenance workers - the backbones of this money-making institution which care about their lot (or not?).  I couldn’t help roving and surveying with my eye how many of them, years in age ranging between 20s and 60s, stood around to serve strangers’ beck and call.  I couldn’t help asking who they might be, and what circumstances brought them to this place.  I couldn’t help asking, “How do they honestly feel moving about in this dance of standing close by, and waiting to please folks they have not met before?  Just how do they really feel about being in this surrounding of affluence, privilege and extravagance?  On their days of rest away from this place, are they, and their loved ones or peers able to come in and use the grounds they have helped tend and keep?

When I leave this setting in a few days, I hope to get answers. I hope to have substantial answers to understanding this reality of human divide – rich pitted with poor … materially.  If not, I hope to at least keep the people and their lot alive in my psyche, and to keep searching how the resource divide gap could be narrowed. 

For now, I will mind the gifts of service and smiles of the people who comfort my waking and sleeping hours.  For now, I will wallow in the beauty and comfort that this playground affords me and like travelers from far or near places. 

For now, I’ll let a smile say my appreciation and thanksgiving in this coming and going.