Public benches were made to be relational. Sure, they usually attract solo sitters, but benches have a generosity of space, as if they’re encouraging you to find a friend to sit for a while.
Which is why I was relaxing on a bench in Havre de Grace,Maryland, with my good friend, Bill Lawson. We had come to visit for the weekend, and while the women wandered, Bill and I chose a bench in the shade with an unimpeded view of the Chesapeake Bay. I went through my usual drill,trying to get grounded in that space in that moment. The day was glorious, with only a single line of clouds over the far shore. A steady breeze tempered the scorching heat and churned up the water into small, choppy waves. It also brought out the sailboats. The watery expanse was dotted with slow-moving white triangles.
Then there were the powerboats. Their roar continually broke into the bucolic scene.
“Sometimes they get so loud, we can hear them back at the house,” said Bill, who lives a couple of miles from the harbor. “Too much testosterone. Like suped-up pickup trucks.”
We watched the motorboats plowing through the water, some like sleek, black arrows, others bulkier and slower. Bill pointed to one of the latter. “See that? I looked that one over at the dock. It’s from the 70’s but hasn’t been restored. The seats and everything are all torn up. But seeing it was like a time machine – it took me back to when I was a teenager and dreamed of having a boat like that.”
I knew the draw of a fast boat. As a teen, I’d sit in the back of my uncle’s speedboat on a lake in Ontario as he’d open up the throttle on the Evinrude. There was such a rush – not only of wind in my hair (yes, those were the good old days), but of adrenaline as the boat skimmed along, rhythmically slapping the water. It’s funny that rush can mean both an external movement and an internal reaction.
Contrast that to sailing. I’ve never sailed, but it’s easy to see the difference. Powerboats create their own environment of sound, speed, wind, and spray. Sailboats just use the environment they’re given. I watched the two kinds of crafts coming toward each other. That contrast of speed struck me as a pointed picture of what I’m trying to do: slow down and take what the environment gives me. We live in the rush of life. We live for the rush of life. We’re driven, focused, intentional. And for good reason: so much of life demands being on task. But what suffers from living at a speed-boat pace?
Relationships.
There is no full-throttle for building relationships. There’s a certain languorous pace to it. It’s why we say we spend time getting to know someone. It costs us. In time. And patience. And attention. All are rewarded, in the best friendships. But the outlay comes first. We have to make ourselves slow down.
As if to illustrate the point, an old man, walking stiffly with a cane, made his way down the long jetty to sit and watch the boats. The fact is that most of us will be forced to slow down, eventually. It’d be wise to start now, while we’re able to really enjoy our surroundings. And talk to the person on the bench with us.
Bill never bought that powerboat he dreamed of. He does own a canoe, though – the same canoe that he kindly loaded in the back of his nonsuped pickup and put into the bay so that my daughter and I could have a wonderfully slow paddle around a nearby island, where we watched the birds.
And talked.
No comments:
Post a Comment