There are some things that are inevitable in life. Birth is one, death is another and in between the two you can be fairly sure that virtually every time you enter a Post Office you will be forced to join a queue.
I just wanted three stamps. I know that there are lots of places you can buy stamps these days, including supermarkets and newsagents, but they come in books of six or ten and I only wanted three. I'm also quite old fashioned in some ways; I get my milk from the milkman (or should that be milkperson in these politically correct times), I get my meat from the butchers, I get my fruit and veg from the greengrocer and I buy my stamps at the Post Office. I accept that as part of the process I will have to queue.
The Post Office I went to has an enlightened policy. Instead of a queue at each window there i one queue that feeds them all, stopping scientific discussions of why the queue you choose is inevitably the slowest moving queue. So I entered the Post Office today to join said queue and as I waited patiently (yes, you doubters, I was patient) I engaged in one of my favourite pat times, people watching!
There was a young lady with a pram containing a chortling baby. I noticed she had no wedding ring. Was she a single mum abandoned by the childs father? Maybe she was living happily with somebody who provided for her and the baby, a father who stayed out of love for his partner and child. Perahps she was married and just not wearing a wedding ring. Its easy to act on first impressions and make judgements, but how wrong we can often be.
Behind me was a lady reading a newspaper as she stood waiting. I hadn't seen her and jostled her paper with my elbow, dislodging several pages in the process. I picked them up, apologising profusely and received a warm smile and a thank you. Such moments bring a glow to the heart, a moment of real engagement with somebody I've never spoken to before and maybe never will again. How many lives do we touch fleetingly as we make our own journey through life?
There was an older gentleman wearing a three peice suit, crisp white shirt and impeccably knotted silk tie. In his button hole was a fresh carnation. Was he off to a wedding or was he just one of the old school who think a gentleman should be correctly dressed at all times?
Another person who caught my eye was a man of similar age to myself, wearing baggy tracksuit bottoms and a hoodie, with the hood down. For some reason I was reminded of a baby in a baby grow and found myself uncharitably wondering why an adult would want to dress like an infant. This was wrong of me. What business is it of mine how other people dress? If he's comfortable in tracky bottoms and a hoodie why should that be grounds for critiscism? The answer is that it shouldn't. Our society is far too obsessed by how people look when what really matters is what's inside, what Martin Luther King called 'the content of their character'.
As I looked at all these wonderful, individual, amazing people I reflected what a wonderful and amazing God we have; a God who loves and cares enough to make us all different, who takes time in creating individuals and who loves and cherishes each and every one of us. May I see others through God's eyes and love them as he loves them.
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