In the early morning train ride it is me and the latino working men on the train. I live in a mostly Dominican neighborhood, but I can’t say I know everyone’s decent. There was a big puddle of some kind of clear-ish white liquid floating on a couple of seats. Each stop someone would come on the train and try to sit in the disgusting liquid and everyone on our side of the car would call out to them to warn them not to sit down. After several stops of this happening one man walks over to the mess with a few paper towels he seems to pull out of now where, and starts attempting to clean the mess, mostly just wiping the liquid onto the floor. The man next to me whispered something about the mess now being on the ground. Then the man spoke in Spanish. It sounded like he was talking about God, he pointed up to the sky as he was speaking. But it didn’t sound preachy.
I asked the man next to me what he said- he said “he’s talking about Jesus, about how we have to do good things.” He didn’t exactly smile and me but he looked at me warmly. I thought I heard him say quietly “He’s right”
I look at the mess. The liquid was now all over the ground near the seats and the towels he used to clean them up he left- dropped all soggy in the puddle underneath the seats, along with the paper covering that belonged to whatever box of liquid-containing bottles has been spilled there.
This whole thing was funny to me. .
It really seemed to come from a humble place. But how much good did he do? There was just a new mess to clean that was on the ground instead of the seat. Telling everyone else to do good deeds because God is watching… so should we all go around wiping people’s messes onto the floor? I for one was pretty pleased with the original good deed of calling out to every person who almost sat in the mess. But to each his own good deed.
My friend Annie is running a freaking MARATHON this weekend for the first time. I could write an entire blog post about how inspiring this woman is to me. But instead I decided to share this poem that I wrote for her.
The Marathon Girl
I wish I could be there to cheer her on
I wish I could be there when she’s won
I wish I could feed her spaghetti all day
Help her carb load- in a true friends way
I won’t be there when she crosses the line
I will be here thinking of her all the time
This girl can run fast, this girl can run slow
This girl she runs smart cus she a dirty ho
She has inspired me, each day she runs
she runs in the rain and she runs in the sun
Cus when she sets out with an idea in her heart
I know Nothing can stop her, I know from the start
She is the sign of a true champion
She runs for herself so she always wins
This big giant thing she is not afraid of
She ate it for breakfast and now it’s what she’s made of
She runs for her body and she runs for her soul
She runs to have peace as she runs to her goal
She runs to find strength already inside
She runs to her life- she does not hide
She takes big things on, thats why she’s here
Little by little she dissolves her fear
So lucky am I to know this girl
Now run, marathoner, around the world!
And when you are done know that I am so proud of you.
I have watched you work this whole year through
You show me the impossible can be done
Nothing is too big for us to run.
This girl began her training for this marathon with a single short run. On that note- tomorrow,
