Are We Rich Enough?

Some years ago, I was walking along the beach in Southampton with a friend who owns a summer home just to the north in an area just a smidge less affluent.  “I can’t believe how much money these people have to be able to afford a house here,” remarked my friend.  Funny thing was, I was thinking about how much money he has to be able to live his lifestyle.  And I thought about some of my other friends and how they must look at us and wonder how much money we earn to afford our way of life.  There seems to be no ends on the spectrum of wealth.  No matter how much you have, there is going to be someone who has more, and many who have less.

This is a prevailing theme in all areas of life.  No matter how good a cook you are, someone is going to serve up a more magnificent meal.  No matter how poorly you jump rope, someone else will always trip over the cord.  Think you have a clean house?  Someone else’s is shinier.  As talented as you are at writing, millions of other authors are the chosen published ones.

And then there are the back of the pack runners.  We run together back there, not always on a front of solidarity, but mostly because we can’t run fast enough to get away from each other.  We gaze in wonderment at the ease by which the faster runners wing past us.  We breathlessly admire the speed, gracefulness and, seemingly to us, the effortlessness of their gait. They are the envy, as well as the pride, of the gang behind them.  We cheer them and encourage them to go beyond what we strive for in our strides. 

But I have to wonder.  Are they, too, caught up in the dissatisfaction of their limits?  Do they not see themselves as we see them?  They can breathe while they run – what must it be like? Would that it was possible to run in their sneakers and have the experience of barely touching the ground while you run. We share their frustration during their agonies of defeat, because we feel it much more frequently. We can also have a good run and get a taste of triumph in the pace we set. How much different then, are they from us?  Do they have the same conversations among them as we have among ourselves?  Do they beat themselves up too – these idols we chase?  Are we all really just running around in circles or are we running towards our goals?

We are all together on this track. Everything is relative and perspectives can be skewed.  When we acknowledge the strength that is already inherently our own and no one else’s we become aware of our individual wealth.  We can silence the jeering voices in our heads and not allow them to rob us any longer.  We find out that our inner souls are gold plated, our rubber soles have been dipped in bronze and all our hopes have a silver lining.  We are all rich enough. 

Patches

One gets to see all manner of life and lives as an appliance repair person.  And Flagstaff is home to all manner of these lives.  We service the exceedingly wealthy who are in town occasionally to visit their second homes in the gated communities.  We go on calls to the indigent who have been led off the streets or brought in from their camps in the forest by social assistance organizations and are living in shacks that are in dire need of some social assistance of their own.

We were asked to check out a refrigerator in one of these housing authority communities.  We were told the tenant was always home, so we didn’t need to make an appointment.  It was in “the neighborhood.” The neighborhood where the crime level is higher.  The neighborhood where there are chain link fences jailing growling dogs.  The neighborhood where the only landscaping is what will grow despite the broken cemented areas and forgotten refuse.  The neighborhood where landlords charge exorbitant rents for houses and mobile homes that somehow still stand defiantly despite their structures and utilities being absolutely against code.

We walked up to the mobile home’s front door after Rob cautioned me to lock the truck.  The steps were rickety looking, but actually swayed as we were let into the house by the tenant.  The interior belied the exterior – it was in a much cleaner condition than expected.  Tinny strands of an aria were being broadcast through a timeworn radio. The man of the house was of medium height and build with a face that I considered belied his age.  I guessed he was younger than he looked.  His thinning, fine hair sprung from his head.  His eyebrows were triumphant arches over his blood-shot eyes whose crystalline blue still claimed predominance, even in his attempt to avert them.  His shirt was flannel.  His jeans – and they were jeans at one time – were covered in beautifully hand sewn patches of every color and pattern imaginable.   (Later, I told Rob that I actually thought he looked a little like me. Rob replied, “Indeed.  He had the map of Ireland all over his face, too.”)  What he lacked in words he certainly made up for in movement as he darted about the room with anticipation-charged energy – eyebrows arching and hands clapping in what can only be described as delight.

We all squeezed into the kitchen area as Rob opened the refrigerator and proceeded to diagnose the problem.  Rob mumbles a lot, hems and haws, chews his lip and has a decent amount of eyebrow arching himself while he thinks out a problem.  I am Rob’s mind-reading-right-hand man, and tool-provider, but before I could rummage through my toolbox for the flashlight, the man had whipped one out from who-knows-where and was dancing behind Rob to shed the best possible beam.  Rob was only intent on the job before him, but I was beginning to take more notice of this guy. 

I told him I loved the music he was listening to.  He said he only listens to NPR.  The more he spoke, the more I sensed he was beginning to trust, and the longer he would hold eye contact.  He said even NPR is one-sided, but if the media was going to try to manipulate you, he would rather listen to that side.  But he mostly listed to NPR for the classical music because it was so soothing.

Meanwhile, back at the refrigerator -- when Rob would free a screw from the back panel, cheers from the eyebrow gallery were raised; the flashlight beam would spin around the room before resuming its place on the next screw.  When Rob had trouble with the wiring, little hops of piqued energy from the tenant were transmitted to Rob’s fingertips, and sure enough, the flashlight would twirl in celebration as the wiring obeyed.  This guy was getting to me.  I was becoming totally engaged in his vigor.  Rob started feeling it too.  Every successful turn of the screw was being met with applause.  Every unsuccessful attempt at a fix brought a momentary pall to the action.  Flashlights and eyes were twinkling, while Pavarotti was serenading our drama.

Finally – it worked!  The new fan was spinning.  There was an invisible group hug that was felt by all the hearts in the room.  Patches, as I was now beginning to call him in my mind, was ecstatic.  There was no question of the joy he was now experiencing.  Rob and I packed up our tools.  I was a little sad to be leaving.  I enjoyed my time with Patches so much.  But there was something else. Something else that seemed so contradictory to this moment of happiness I was just a part of – that Patches had pulled me into.  He was so thrilled to have been part of fixing his refrigerator, elated that is was fixed, but…

There was no food in the refrigerator.  At all.

Leadville, Colorado

Leadville.  Hump day of the TransRockies 6 day foot race that Rob was once again running.  It was the scene of catastrophe for the pair of runners I was rooting for in 2009.  How would it differ in 2011?

For starters, no one in 2009 clambered to get aboard our 1988 Ford truck with our 1988 Bigfoot camper strapped on its back.    Not so in 2011.  Stage Two of the race ended at Twin Lakes.  The race organizers did have vans aplenty for the runners to travel the 15 miles to the Leadville camp.  But when 5 Flagstaff runners asked if they could hitch a ride with us, we thought, sure, what the heck.  It quickly became reminiscent of the days when college kids would try to squeeze as many of them as they could into a VW bug or a phone booth.  These guys saw an opening and swarmed, lighting into the Bigfoot like senseless moths. Unflappable as I am, I finally closed the door behind the 10^th “passenger,” and swatted the rest of them away.  We recounted the story of the trip to Leadville at the camp dinner that night. Eric, who was also part of the 2009 race, shot out with amazement: “Did they not know the history of that truck?!”

Catastrophe was completely averted as we arrived successfully at camp and everyone exited the clown bus.  Rob ran a very successful, albeit, hard run for himself.  Much unlike 2009 he did not have to jack the truck up after he ran, attempt to fix the brakes, have the truck fall off the jack, and then figure out how to get the truck back up and fixed.  Then take a shower, have dinner, and get some rest so he could run 24 miles with his partner the next day.  This was a vacation compared to 2 years ago.  He had hours available to him to rest.  He doesn’t rest when he’s at home and finishes long runs.  He did not know how to do this thing called rest.  I had to show him.  I demonstrated by lying down in the bed and falling asleep.  I was completely unfazed that he laid there watching me throughout my whole demonstration.  Well, a little fazed.  His eyes finally bored their way into my unconscious until his competing restlessness won out over my nap.

We decided to take a stroll around the town.  Leadville sits at an elevation of about 10,000 feet.  I don’t know what the means of income is for the residents.  It’s a small town.  Many of the homes that aren’t ramshackle are Victorian-like with scalloped eves and painted many colors.  There’s a certain grit to the atmosphere there.  It’s a town of unique individuals.  Many have their teeth still, but many do not.  Most have all their appendages, but some do not.  Many have a certain roughness to their edges, but some are nymph-like as they flit in and out of your life, sprinkling their fairy gritty-dust that quivers your spirit.  The magic of Leadville is palpable.

Leadville invites you to enjoy the experience of living in the present and simultaneously feel the soul of a life from generations ago.  Maybe it’s this duality that unbalances people that live there.  But just maybe it’s the present that is unstable for these residents and they have found their balance there.  Something of consequence has always happened to me when visiting Leadville.

We were walking hand-in-hand as we passed a hovel that was home to some old hippies.  The evening was approaching and the air was changing from the dusty heat of the day to the cool flowery scent of mountain air as it welcomed the twilight’s humidity.  The birds were discovering their last bugs of the day and the townsfolk were discovering the bloom of their early evening high.  As we walked by the hippie house I knew they were watching us – and probably with as much curiosity as I was watching them.  We were different kinds of people.  We wore different kinds of clothes, we engaged in different habits of personal hygiene; we lead different kinds of lives.  These generalizations were pronounced in the few seconds it was taking us to walk by their house.  And yet, there was something that transcended our differences.  The hippies, beer cans in hand, joints singeing fingers, slowly shifted and called out to us, “You guys are beautiful!  You are so in love!”  I was clearly in agreement and answered back that indeed we are and that life is great.  And we thanked them.

It was a moment with a connection.  It was Leadville.