Community & Crockpots

My friend, Katie, puts it all out there without fear or hesitation.  I admire her openness, her willingness to be vulnerable, her silliness and unwavering faith, her commendable common sense.

We sit in a bar listening to a mutual friend and blues playing musician and she tells me about her husband's death, about her current crushes and her children, her job and her art.  Above all, she believes in a tender (and female) God and what she calls "community" - the integration of family and friends and neighbors to make a kinder and gentler, more equitable world.  She practices this philosophy with shy sincerity and dedication, going out of her way to be helpful and encouraging to those she meets along the way and I feel a strong kinship to her, as if we have traveled some of the same emotional roads and shared some of the same experiences.  I would like to be more like her.

We talk about community, about how much easier it is to give than ask for or accept help, about confidence and entanglements and independence.  She doesn't hold back with her feelings or beliefs, she's articulate and passionate all in one breath - and it dawns on me that being brave isn't about just not being afraid, it's about being not afraid to let it show - Katie offers up her feelings with an honesty that I find fascinating and startling.

The conversation turns to dogs and I tell her about trying to change the little dachshund's diet and the fact that without a working stove I have to rely on a hotplate - my most recent effort to boil chicken meant doing it one chicken breast at a time and predictably I fell asleep in the middle of this haute cuisine extravaganza, waking only after the water had evaporated, the chicken blackened and the house filled with smoke.  She laughed and immediately volunteered to boil the next batch for me ...that community thing again ...and then with a wide smile she made the ultimate practical suggestion, pointing out that if I were to invest in a crockpot, I could do an entire chicken and not even have to be home.  The simplicity and sheer obviousness of this idea was so elementary and so stark that I gawked at her while I tried to digest it and it was several seconds before I found my voice.

A crockpot! I exclaim in wonder, trying hard not be stricken by my own denseness, Katie!  You're a genius!

Community, she says with a serene smile, That's how it works.

About a week later, I arrive home to find a bright red plastic bag sitting prominently on my doorstep.  In it, is a brand new crockpot in its own carrying case - my friend Tricia has taken it upon herself to provide an early and much appreciated Christmas gift - despite the fact that she is fully aware that I can barely boil water, she's taken the time and trouble to do me a good turn.

Long live simple problems and the friends who help solve them.