The World We Choose

I’ve been stuck on this picture for a few days.

At first it was just a collection of memories of the Big Guy hopping out of the car on the way home for the last thing on our shopping list.

Now I realize I’ve been a using it to stay connected with our very small world, where  people still leave doors unlocked, kids walk in the woods alone and people from completely different walks of life can solve the world’s problems over a heated discussion at the country store and still lock arms for a square dance at the annual ox roast.

They’re little things in the grand scheme of things like a sporadically imploding economy, violence and a deteriorating environment, but there’s something good in keeping the honor box healthy and being able to see the things that bind us more brightly than the things that can divide and destroy us.  So when I paint the cooler with the brown eggs and the honor box over and over again, it’s not an escape.  It’s an exercise in optimism.