THE MORE THINGS CHANGE...

I just came back from picking up a few groceries curbside at Basil Bandwagon in Lambertville. It’s a very handy arrangement. I simply call it in, give them my credit card, call them when I get there, and someone brings it out to me. It’s the latest in 21^st century shopping, so to speak.

As easy and convenient as it may be, it has a downside. You can’t stroll the aisles like a true hunter/gatherer, and look over all the possibilities for a truly good shopping spree. There are options that you miss out on since you are not usually aware of a store’s complete inventory. Considering the fact that I frequently—no, always—end up buying more than I have on my list when I physically go inside, the upside is that I’m probably saving money on this newer version.

Anyway, when I was growing up, my parents did most of their shopping at Wills’ Grocery Store, up the hill at the South end of Main Street—in former years, long ago, the company store for the Star Glass Factory in Medford. When we would go there in person, I would go out the back screen door to the place where the glass factory once stood, and dig in the ground for bits of glass—and I usually found some. It was a great market for kids to go to, not only because of that, but because they had tin bins of cookies to choose your favorites from.

However, most of the shopping was done by phone. My mother would call in an order and the owner, Ed Wills, would write it down, and it would be delivered right to our house. Ed didn’t deliver it himself. He had a couple of men, brothers of his I believe, who would take turns delivering. They would come up the side walkway of the house with a cardboard box on their shoulders, walk into the kitchen, unannounced, and put the groceries on the counter and leave after a brief conversation. Then once a month, as far as I can remember, my dad would go to the store and pay for whatever we had gotten. Ed and his wife, Edith, kept a running tab, without the aid of a computer, and things were handled quite smoothly with cash only.

It brings to mind that old saying that “everything that goes around, comes around,” although that saying is usually applied to karma—that “as you sow, so shall you reap.”  But it can also refer to the idea that “the more things change, the more they stay the same.” 

There is a new day ahead that none of us, even the greatest experts among us, can tell what shall yet unfold in the nature of life. The best we can come up with is that things are going to be different than we have previously known them to be. While some, particularly Evangelical Christians perhaps, may look at this time as some version of an Armageddon, I seriously doubt that God has reached the limits of Divine patience—at least that’s my theological opinion. Otherwise, that would have happened a long time ago.

My image of God is not that of one who is into “slapping you upside the head” to get your attention, but rather of one willing to provide the inner strength, peace of mind and heart, spiritual wisdom, and emotional healing to handle whatever comes our way—if we are willing to take the time to pause and listen (also known as contemplation). We just need to trust and do it.

                             Just a thought.