Not Small Enough

It’s a small world! Well, that’s what they say anyways, but I have spent a good part of my life walking and it didn’t seem that small to me. Perhaps if you are in a jet, but lets see if you feel the same way after a 19 hour flight to Australia.

I know what they mean, they are talking about even with a place as big as the world is, you happen to run into people in the oddest places. I have a friend that was pretty involved in local soccer when his kids were small and of course he met quite a few people. This friend can’t go anywhere without meeting someone that he knows. He will stop at a rest stop in the mountains and someone will call his name. He will be on a ferry going to Vancouver Island and meet someone whose daughter he had coached. I have another friend that was on a two month trip through the western states and he ran into a friend on the streets of Great Falls Montana. Weird!

I have always looked for people that I know when I go places, but either there just isn’t anyone that I know or they saw me first. I would love to run into someone that I know when I am in Vegas, or on Kailua beach on Oahu. It would be great to chat with a friend for a while and it wouldn’t hurt for them to know that I am well travelled as well. No, things like that just don’t seem to happen to me in real life.

I’ll tell you what does happen to me though. Sometimes I just need to get by myself and have a coffee, muffin and read my book at McDonalds or Timmies. Of course I run into someone I know and have to talk to them. Sure, it doesn’t sound too bad, but I was looking forward to reading my book and it’s considered rude to read when someone is talking to you. Sometimes when you are driving you are rocking’ out to a song on the radio and when you look in the mirror at the light, you see one of your friends laughing at you. It can be a little embarrassing.

Today for instance was pretty embarrassing. Our family is sponsoring another family this Christmas and I have to drop the wrapped gifts off on Wednesday morning. I need to have a few largish boxes to carry the gifts in, but I gave all of the largish boxes that I had to my daughter when she moved this year. I went out in search of boxes today. I could have gone to a grocery store, but I thought that I would have better luck at the community recycling bins. I drove over to the Safeway parking lot and saw some boxes down in the dumpster. There is just an 8 or 9 inch slot to push the cardboard into the bin, but if I took my hat off I could just get my head and one arm in to see if there were any good boxes. I found one in the first bin and moved to the second to try my luck there. I had my hat in hand and head and arm in the bin, but there were no good boxes. I pulled my head out of the bin only to find my buddy with an arm load of cardboard staring at me in disbelief.

It’s a small world alright, but not small enough!