As I was watching my beautiful husband cook pancakes for the family this morning, I got to chase the kids around creating all kinds of mayhem under foot! It was great fun! Our fun only multiplied as Willow found one of Chris' antique Tibetan/Budhist handbell's and started ringing it with every toddle-run back and forth thru the house, screeching with delight. I thought Chris just might loose his marbles with the noise, but thankfully, there had been enough time and real coffee in him to loosen him up and he joined in as well. "A-YA-YA! A-YA-YA!!!", and stomp your feet and chase is all that is required to be part of this group of barnstormers. After several runs thru the house, we pretty well fell into a heap of laughing pile-o-toddlers and the kids took off for something else that had caught their attention.
This left me pondering the moment we'd had as a family with this item once used to call people to prayer and remind them of the Greater Power around them.... Sacriledge or honor? What had we done? How could such a wonderful moment of enjoyment of children not be an honor ~ I don't believe my Creator would see that as disrespectful.... And, as much as I know of our wonderful Tibetan friends/culture, I really can't imagine they would be offended either. We Americans seem to be one of the few cultures that have lost the sacredness and honoring of children and older ones in our society. What a poor culture, a poor society, that places priorities of building monetary gain over raising your own children.... These days is times, especially now, it is near impossible to survive without at least both parents working, at least one job each ~ if they are lucky enough to be employed. Where does that leave our children and older generation? Who is there to cherish and encourage their speech, their bonding with family, their intellect, their growth, and development? They learn to compete with other babies for the attention and toys before they are even a year old in a daycare setting. I wonder what the long-term outcome for our American society will be with the generational break that has occurred. With the ringing of the hand-bell, I'm brought to the ringing of our alarm bells on our societies' family unit decline.... however you choose to define your family unit.
So, where are our 'Bells-of-Mindfulness' today? These calls to prayer that migrated with the shipping trade from the Far East, to be 'borrowed' by other religious traditions until they were fully integrated; church bells becoming a symbol of Christianity, no less, used on ships to ward off who-knows-what, and eventually used to open session in our early schools.... now just used to announce class change. Where are our bells today? We no longer use them to announce the ringing of a phone call. We no longer have the hourly church bells ringing across the countryside. Do we have anything in our society to remind us throughout the day that we (or the pursuit of money) are not the top of the theoretical food chain? I guess I'm not too picky... I don't really care who your Higher Power is, as long as you believe in one. To me, believing otherwise is "really quite presumptuous and rude." (To quote Willy Wonka) It's up to you to pick the right one for you; not me to sit in judgment.
How much richer a society would we be if we were occasionally reminded throughout our day, every day, that we did have a Higher Power watching over us...? How many of us would make different decisions...........how differently would people live?
