By Tommi Halvorsen Gatlin
For The Vidette
Since my five children attained adulthood years ago, there’s a lot I don’t do nowadays. Shopping for new school clothing and supplies and even keeping track of when a new school term begins are all distant memories for me.
I did work at a school for a time after I retired, but that’s also been a while. I’ve heard mention of a new school year having just begun this month, though.
Because the elementary school in my home district didn’t offer kindergarten, my parents enrolled me in first grade at Renton’s Kennydale School when was 5 years old. My first teacher, Mrs. Hanks, was nearly as short as my mother, who was less than 4 feet, 11 inches tall. But her small stature didn’t keep her from being a great teacher. We weren’t very tall either, so it may even have endeared her to us.
For the most part, I did well in school through the years, though there’s one thing that’s always been difficult for me — hurtful competition between people. And human nature being what it is, that’s something that, sadly, can happen in groups of any age.
A while back, for example, I joined a number of other adults for a fun activity I’d not participated in for a very long time. I was a bit nervous about not being up-to-date on the specifics but figured it wouldn’t be a major problem; I’d just ask for help if I needed it.
Receiving only a cursory amount of information about how to participate, though, I became increasingly uneasy. Then, when I added to the conversation at one point (not as a request for help), they seemed not to hear me at all. It turned out not to be the fun time I’d anticipated.
In all fairness, the others might not have realized I was having a hard time about that. Moreover, my own human nature may have done the same to others in the past, causing me to be the one less attuned and helpful to someone new to a group.
It’s insignificant what the exact activity was, and I won’t identify it because I don’t want to cause any distress to the people I was with, should any of them see this.
But I read something last week that touched my heart with a poignant reminder to be more aware of others and their need to know they’re not only welcome to any group I happen to be in — but more importantly, they’re wanted there.
Each day, I use a little booklet called “Our Daily Bread” as a devotional guide to the studying the Bible. The title for that days’ reading was “I Will.” It was about a woman who’d just sunk into her recliner after a long day. Looking out a window, she saw an older couple trying to move a fence section marked “free” in a nearby yard.
Getting back up from the recliner, the woman, joined by her husband, went out to help the couple load the fencing onto a hand truck and move it up a street and around a corner to the older couple’s home, laughing at how the four of them must have appeared to the neighborhood. As they returned together for another fence section, the older woman asked the other lady, “You be my friend?”
“Yes, I will,” said the other, who later learned that her new Vietnamese friend knew little English and was very lonely.
The writer then noted that God has called us to love others as ourselves.
That’s not always easy for us toting around this really imperfect human nature. But it is something we can do if we take seriously Jesus’ words in Matthew 22: 37-39 in the Bible’s New Testament:
“Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.”
I’m wanting more than ever to practice that, and to keep doing so. It’ll no doubt be a challenge, but with God’s help, it should be an exciting and rewarding journey.
To reach columnist Tommi Halvorsen Gatlin, send an email to rhoda1946@yahoo.com.
