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Written by Karen D. Swim
It was 5:00 pm on Friday. Normally, I would be doing a serious happy dance at this hour. I looked at the clock and realized that it was 5pm on a Friday and I needed to go to the bank. I had to make a deposit that could not wait for the next business banking day. No big deal, hop in the car and make the 5 mile round trip to the bank. Except, I didn’t have my car. I had no choice I’d have to get there on foot.
I run or walk to the bank frequently. It’s 2 ½ miles each way and a pleasant trip. Today was different. It had rained on and off all day and the trek to the bank only had concrete on one short block. It happens to be the block across the street from the bank, like a reward at the end of your hike through the perilous suburban jungle.
I threw on my coat, backpack and hat and headed out the door. I skipped the mascara because on my last trip to the bank, it rained on me and the result was not pretty. I felt like a human Pac Man (or woman) as I dodged back and forth to avoid the goose poop. I made it to main road and carefully balanced myself on the sloping mud strip that passed as our sidewalk. (For some odd reason, my township is not fond of sidewalks or even tiny borders that protect you from oncoming traffic.) I narrowed my eyes against the bright lights of oncoming traffic while trying desperately to avoid road kill (eww) and becoming road kill by the rush hour traffic that was whizzing by me. With all the grace of a football player on a balance beam I carefully picked my way down the road.
As yet another wave of traffic whizzed by, I imagined myself as one of the characters on the TV show Without A Trace. At the start of every episode, they show a normal person going about their routine and then they fade out – vanished without a trace. Unable to shake the image of me fading out on a dark suburban road on a Friday night, I panicked.
My head spun with crazy thoughts – What if I was snatched by mad truckers or a band of vagrants? What if a car hit me and I fell into a ditch and I was unconscious or dead? What if no one noticed I was missing and they didn’t start looking for 2 ½ weeks? What if they found my poor rumpled body? I wasn’t even wearing mascara! What would they think?
Earlier that day I read a post by Robert Hruzek which discussed what people conclude about you by observing you. On Without a Trace the FBI investigators piece together your profile by digging into the various aspects of your life. I wondered what would they think about me. Would they know that my kitchen drawer was partially open because I had considered eating my last Aristo bar but decided to save it? Would they know that the gray sweat shirt neatly folded on my bed was freshly laundered and one of my favorites? Would they know I hated my current laundry detergent and had only bought it in an effort to reduce my carbon footprint?
Would they dig in my email? Read my tweets? Open my file drawers? What would they think? What profile would emerge from the seemingly disparate pieces of my life? The question hung in the darkness looming over me like the storm clouds that threatened from the sky.
By 5:26 I had made my deposit and was walking out of the bank. The question greeted me once again in the darkness grabbing hold demanding to go all the way home with me. I opened my front door at 5:58 and stood for a moment. I looked around as a stranger might to gain a new perspective. The warmth and soft smell of cinnamon wrapped around me. I decided a stranger would like that too.
I then realized that I did not need to answer the question, I only needed to allow it to guide me in my day-to-day actions. However, I wanted to be remembered should also be the way I live my life. Was I living a life of purpose and intention? Am I treating people with kindness and respect? Am I using my gifts and talents in service to others?
I bounded up the stairs, renewed and resolved that the next time I left the house I would indeed be wearing mascara!
References:
Robert Hruzek, Who do you Think You Are?