A Bargain At Forty Times the Price…

I wanted to introduce you to a young man I just met, although our association is so far quite brief - I believe I know a good deal about this young man already, and I also believe that your time would be equally well spent in meeting him.

His name is Caleb.

From what I know so far, it is a fitting name, and one that has it’s origins in the Bible. Caleb was a companion of Moses and Joshua, and his name means “faithful, devoted, whole-hearted”, he was noted in the Bible for having astute powers of observation and fearlessness, in the face of overwhelming odds.

The Caleb I recently met, has the beginnings of the type of character that could well become powerfully astute and fearless. I already know that he is faithful, devoted, and wholehearted.

I first heard about him from a neighbor I see, very occasionally, in the small park at the very end of my subdivision. She too, is a dog walker and on the rare occasion when just right timing allows us to be united in stopping at every bush, tree, rock, and small weed that we pass, in the time honored - sniff, sniff, pee, pee - tradition of dog companions the world round…we have the opportunity for a brief chat.

She told me of a young boy who comes to her house and collects up her dog poop for two dollars and fifty cents a visit and how much she enjoys paying him for this small service. As she described him, I was put in mind of an era gone by, when young men came to your home in kinder, gentler times and used a silent mower to groom your lawn, pushing a spinning and cutting steel edge, as it kicked up green blades and the wonderful, summer breeze-born perfume, of cut grass.

I thought how clever he was, to have come to this time honored tradition of the young providing their neighbors with service - for an age appropriate sum - in a desert enviroment where grass is a rare occurrence, but dogs are plentiful. And I smiled at his ingenuity…

Next I heard of him from my closest neighbor, also in his employ for the picking up of dog leavings, but here there was an added item on his service menu.

I live in a subdivision that should be ashamed of itself, for calling the tiny patch of ground that surrounds our homes a “yard”…for it surely should not be so named. If it were indoors I doubt it would pass code for properly being called a hallway, and yet, my house and my neighbors were the models for the subdivision and were planted with trees that, when mature, became looming monsters in our hallway of a “yard”.

I am a tree hugger of the first order, but as those two trees in my backyard, loomed taller than the two-story house behind me, filling my tiny passageway with debris and lifting my cinder block fence out of it’s moorings, I did the ruthless thing, and had them cut down.

Only then did my home begin to breathe again. I felt the appropriate measure of sorrow over their loss, but truly, I would do it again in a heartbeat.

Not so my neighbor, he is living in a rental and his two trees mere inches from his windows, shadow his home to the degree that I cannot imagine any light at all, penetrating their leafy green expanse…and more, they drop leaves like they are running to keep up with a demanding boss, and an overblown production quota.

My neighbor’s trash bin cannot keep up with the bag after bag of leaves he must dispose of on a weekly basis, so while chatting with him and recommending that he utilize the empty real estate in my bin for the removal of his wild over production of dropped leaf matter, he told me of a young boy who, now in his employ, does all the stuffing of leaves into bags he once had to spend his time doing. I realized it had to be the same young entrepreneur I had already heard about from the dog walker….”so, tell me more about him”, I said to my neighbor.

“Well, he’s young - eight or so - he comes by twice per week, and fills up my garden trash bags. He is paying his dad back for a computer game, (or something like that, I can’t quite remember), that has already been purchased for him, under the agreement that he would pay for half of it out of chores and such. He also has a deal with his dad that he won’t go into any of the houses he works for”, (in years gone by, he would have been given lemonade and cookies at the kitchen table, when he was finished with his chores…but, sadly, those days are gone).

I asked my neighbor to have him come to my house the next time he came by, as I would be VERY glad, to have the same done for me.

And in this way, I answered my doorbell to find young Caleb standing on my front porch…

He is indeed somewhere in the seven to nine age range, (I am not good at guessing that), and he has the angelic face that will one day find him voted the “most handsome” boy in school.

He looked up at me from under curly brown hair, framing a perfectly molded face with high cheekbones, good structure, startlingly crystalline clear blue eyes, and a lovely smile framed by a cupid bow’s lip-line.

He will one day turn into a real stunner…

He introduced himself, giving me his Biblically derived name, and inquired if he could help me in some way. At first, as my three tiny dogs bounced around him on the front porch - desperately wanting his attention - he misunderstood and assumed I wanted a refuse picker upper, but we soon sorted it out and found the right service.

“I need you to come by twice per month and load the leaves, (migration from my neighbors leaf-producing-champions), that I have blown into a pile, in the front and back yards, into bags.” “How much do you think that would cost?” I inquired.

He paused….and very thoughtfully…tracked through his pricing policies. “Well”, he said, “I charge 2.50 a visit for dog pooper scooping”, and then he worked through my neighbor needs and his mountain of leaves, “and your neighbor pays me 15.00 a month…but since you don’t have any trees…maybe 4.00 dollars for both yards, per visit?”…he concluded.

I allowed as to how that sounded like the exact right charge and then we further worked through our two schedules, and arrived at our only solution…Monday’s… late afternoon.

Just before he got back on his tiny bicycle, having successfully completed our business transaction, he commented on the reverse glass painting I have hanging on my porch wall, right beside my door. I had painted a woman on a piece of glass, head resting on her hand waiting for the long lost return of her loved one, and then mounted her into an old multi paned window frame, I found at some junk store or other.

“I like the woman in your window”, he said…and it took me a minute to realize he was talking about my art piece. “Thank you”, I said, “I used to be an artist and I have lots and lots of paintings, I would show them to you, but I know you have an agreement with your Dad not to come into any of the homes you work at…”

“Yes, that’s right”, he said, just as he mounted his tiny bicycle, turning back in the saddle and promising once more, to come by on our agreed upon Monday…and then he rode himself off toward home.

You might be wondering why his brief visit impacted me enough to be writing an essay about it… well, here is why…

After fifty-five years of life, I know – truly know – only a thimble full of things. One of them is that keeping your word is the single most important thing you can learn to accomplish. And, it is a thing that is now so rare in our culture that it is practically on the endangered species list.

I cannot tell you the number of times that I am exposed to people who tell me one thing and do another. Just this week a co-worker and I decided to meet to struggle through the mind-numbing volume of information we have had dumped upon us, she told me she would call right after her ten o’clock appointment, and we would pick a place to meet. I finally quit waiting for her call at 3 in the afternoon.

I know some folk, who so routinely do not follow through on what they say they will do, that I no longer believe anything they say at all.

I do not have the capacity to express how much damage I believe that does to a life…and more importantly, to the life that follows the one we will face when death comes to take us.

In the three weeks of training that I just went through, we, the new hires, ate through our bosses replenished candy jar with a speed and commitment that was truly impressive, (it had a good deal to do with anxiety about the complexity of the information – or at least that was true for me). And no one other than me, made good on the many promises to replenish his stash that were proffered him over the three weeks we spent together, (I know this because he commented on it).

Even promises this small, left unfulfilled, can one day develop into a mountain of broken agreements until the pressure breaks the back of a life, and ruins any chance that individual may have, to develop into a person of “character”…and yet, young Caleb is already well on his way to this goal I have cherished all of my adult life.

We live in a world that cannot see the forest for the trees. What could it possibly matter if we find ourselves admired by thousands, on multiple continents…showered in good fortune, with a bank account flowing to excess, and approved of by everyone we meet…if we can’t keep the simplest of promises?

If we cannot be trusted with the smallest of things, then Life will not trust us with the most precious of things…the capacity for Depth of Understanding.

I know that the only thing I possess of any value is my developing capacity for Understanding. I know I have been given this gift, not because I found the right teacher…or even because I dedicated myself to following his teachings…but, mainly and simply, because my word has slowly over time, become true.

My creditors, my boss, my friends, my co-workers, my sister, my customers…all have benefited from my desire to be impeccable with my agreements.

A week ago, I told an anonymous young man on the other end of an 800 number, that I would call him back once I had made my purchasing decision so that he would get credit for the sale. When I was unable to do so, it sat on my mind like a thorn, for days on end.

It is my commitment, that should I give my word to even a total stranger that I strive to follow through with as much will as if they were a beloved, so strong is my continuing desire to be trustworthy.

The traumas of my very difficult childhood, caused trust to become the one ingredient in life, I yearned for above all others. Before I met my Teacher and learned his lessons of impeccability of one’s word, there was nothing I trusted in the whole of the world. Now, because of his lessons, and my will, (I have always striven to give to everyone I meet the one thing I want most in the world…and of course, you must give what you want to get…and now), I have the great good fortune to live inside a mind where trust bubbles up as though it were spring water released from the warm and loamy earth. Trust now soothes, and comforts, and enhances, even the smallest corner of my life. (I would mention here that as much, Agape (unconditional) Love, as I hold for my Teacher these twenty-seven years passed, the amount that I trust him is quite literally boundless, and it is due entirely to the impeccability of his word and character).

Caleb is, in these simple agreements he is making with his neighbors, in the process of discovering if he will become trustworthy…

Based just on my first small glance of him, his seriousness of purpose, the fulfilling of his financial agreement with his Father, the noticing of the things around him, like my window lady, speak to a maturity well beyond his years. His simple, yet quite powerful capacity, to determine his price and confidently communicate it, the willingness to produce a schedule and keep to it, (which my neighbor reports is true of him), all this and my intuitive sense of him…brings me the awareness that we are engaged in a great deal more, than saving my aching back from having to fill, lawn and garden trash bags, with yard debris.

In Numbers 14:24, Caleb is called by God “my servant”, a position of highest honor heretofore used only for Moses. I cannot imagine a god who wants us to destroy those whose faith does not align with ours, or who needs us to build showy cathedrals and make loud pronouncements…but I can, and do, imagine a God who cares deeply about a young boy, becoming a Man of Character. The education that the keeping of his word provides, amidst the dry and crumbling leaves of another of God’s creations, is the real work he is engaged in…the profits of which, will last him a lifetime.

He is building for himself the most precious of things, moral fiber, and I am enhancing for myself the most sought after of things, deeper understanding, and all of this, for four dollars per visit…

A bargain, I would say, at forty times the price….

Adayre R. Miller

4/10/11

photo courtesy of Jean Richard (Strogg) and flickr photo sharing to see more of this artist work please follow this link…www.flickr.com/photos/strogg/41152712/