racing the garbage
Tuesday, September 16, 2008 at 7:09 AM 
Yesterday I had a wonderful little “encounter” that I can’t seem to get out of my head and want to share here. I was on my way to work. It was a beautiful sunny morning made all the more delicious because of the gift it is! (At this time of year in Seattle you never know when the sun will disappear and the rain will set in.) Taking full advantage, I hopped on my scooter and headed down the four-lane road. Due to traffic and the not-so-timed lights I found myself stopping and starting quite a bit along with the other cars and in particular a giant garbage truck to my left.
Now imagine this…a little scooter next to a giant smelly garbage truck. Now close your eyes and take a big whiff. Can you smell it? Nice, huh? So, what do you think my instinct was? To get away from the garbage, of course! And so we played this cat and mouse game for a couple of stoplights until I found myself giggling to realize the imagery (& reality) that I was 'racing the garbage.'
Oh, what a metaphor for life!!! Isn’t that what we do all of the time? Race around trying to get away from the garbage!! Sometimes we feel as tiny as a scooter next to a mammoth pile of you-know-what and we go to great lengths to get away from it rather than consider “smelling” things in a new way. And my giggles? Well, I decided to enjoy the sunshine and laugh at the ridiculousness of the situation rather than putting myself in harms way or letting the “smell” ruin my day. I am still chuckling and I have an amazing collage brewing in my mind ☺. hee hee hee.
So, what garbage are you racing today? How will you choose to smell it? Plug your nose? Inhale deeply? Laugh?
I hope you have a grand week. I will be off doing my Soltura thing. I have a couple of posts that will pop up over the next few days, so please stop by. Unfortunately, I won’t be able to respond to comments until I am back, but I will be reading them so please say “hi!”
Reader Comments (4)
Well I wonder what the garbage truck thought of all this. Presumably, garbage smells wonderful to garbage trucks, and perhaps trucky was a little put out at being stalked by this little blue scooter that thought it was better than the garbage ;-)
thanks for putting it all in perspective, tess :-)
btw--this is a faux scooter. my little racer is portofino green. how's that for special? xoxoox
and i know SS is going to gasp at the thought of ANY racing going on!!!
Funny how we'll focus on one thing to the extent that the one (usually small) thing can ruin an otherwise pretty darn good day. Why is that usually in traffic?
The sad thing is that we usually don't notice what we're doing at the time. Giggling saved you - sometimes the absurd will come up and tickle us.
Living in the moment, with awareness - whew! hard work sometimes.
An aside, CP said that yesterday a young woman on a scooter scooted (of course that's what a scooter does, right-scoots?) by his view. She was following a rather big truck and for a moment he thought "the Lucy" was in town:)