Tales from Rural Maine: Grace
About 25 years ago, a nun came up to me at a ball game we were watching in Bucksport and she smiled such a beautiful smile--the kind of smile that happens when eyes and lips are smiling equally--and she said, "You look just like Grace Kelly."
To this day, I can remember that moment. I remember that I was alone there, leaning on the fence. I remember the smell of freshly cut grass and the gentle warmth of early summer sunshine in Maine. I remember I was a little quiet and a little lonely. And I remember noticing that I didn't feel as embarrassed as I usually did when someone gave me a compliment, and that the absence of that discomfort was remarkable and a relief. This woman, she was so gentle, so sincere, so self-less in her remark. It was like...she was just sharing a sweet truth, articulating in six words the poetry of the day; it was as though she had simply said, "The sky looks like heaven today."
We often hold insults and injuries in our hearts long after the moment has passed. It's harder, it seems, for our human hearts to attach themselves to kindness, generosity, beauty; it's harder for us to believe. Instead, we replay a wounding over and over for decades, consciously, unconsciously. While compliments and kindnesses skip off us like stones.
But every now and then, when one human being offers another human being a certain kind of simple, spontaneous kindness, we arrive at an intersection of grace, I believe, which creates a fixed point in time, a touchstone our hearts and minds can return to, spontaneously, for years to come.
Twenty-five years later--a lifetime later--that stranger's kindness is still there for me. Time and distance melt away. That memory rises up on my journey like a guidepost. I can close my eyes, take a breath, feel that sweet summer air on my face, hear the crack of a ball off a teenager's bat and I can believe for just one moment that maybe...I look just like Grace Kelly...
To this day, I can remember that moment. I remember that I was alone there, leaning on the fence. I remember the smell of freshly cut grass and the gentle warmth of early summer sunshine in Maine. I remember I was a little quiet and a little lonely. And I remember noticing that I didn't feel as embarrassed as I usually did when someone gave me a compliment, and that the absence of that discomfort was remarkable and a relief. This woman, she was so gentle, so sincere, so self-less in her remark. It was like...she was just sharing a sweet truth, articulating in six words the poetry of the day; it was as though she had simply said, "The sky looks like heaven today."
We often hold insults and injuries in our hearts long after the moment has passed. It's harder, it seems, for our human hearts to attach themselves to kindness, generosity, beauty; it's harder for us to believe. Instead, we replay a wounding over and over for decades, consciously, unconsciously. While compliments and kindnesses skip off us like stones.
But every now and then, when one human being offers another human being a certain kind of simple, spontaneous kindness, we arrive at an intersection of grace, I believe, which creates a fixed point in time, a touchstone our hearts and minds can return to, spontaneously, for years to come.
Twenty-five years later--a lifetime later--that stranger's kindness is still there for me. Time and distance melt away. That memory rises up on my journey like a guidepost. I can close my eyes, take a breath, feel that sweet summer air on my face, hear the crack of a ball off a teenager's bat and I can believe for just one moment that maybe...I look just like Grace Kelly...
Labels: bucksport, home, love, maine, microstories, tales from rural maine
posted by Naomi at 12:50 PM
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