Salt and Light

In her last seven years, my older sister, Jo, and I had a weekly routine of going out and about. At least once a month we had pedicures and lunch and then poked around in a favorite second hand shop before our final stop for groceries, then home for a nap. Old lady stuff.

One of our frequent destinations included the Kohls department store where we bought clothing that we didn't need. The last couple of years, before she became ill, we, more often than not, left without buying anything because apparently the company garment 'buyers' decided that plus-sized old ladies really should like hip hugger pants and tops with necklines that plunge to center chest.

Spoiler alert: as you age out and you cross through all sorts of thresholds, given that you reach peak and the downward slide moves you along at an accelerated pace, you learn to accept what you cannot change - like fashion, social customs, language and certain predictable cause/effect outcomes based on hard earned experience. 

In other words, there is no use kicking against the pricks when you know your opinion is no longer germane and has zero impact whatsoever.  Jo and I complained to each other but it was just our way of venting frustration on the inevitability of becoming irrelevant. 

Among other things we also grumbled about thin pale type used in everything from instructions to advertising to web pages because it is the 'trend' and not in the least bit practical for old eyes. But trend is how new replaces old as each new generation seeks to find and establish its unique significance. It is a force to be reckoned with as much as it is a circle. One day the current trend influencers will be shocked to find another generation has replaced them too. What goes 'round comes 'round.

Often change is a good thing, of course, though sometimes it is not, even as it is inevitable and unstoppable. For every change that seems to advance civilization there is often a downside that can be cited. Anyone with an ounce of intuition or discernment or who has lived here on this ongoing experiment for fifty or more years can make a list of such gives and takes in the repeating process of the rise and fall of civilization. Personally my list is very long but again, my voice is like a tinkling bell in a wind storm so I'll focus on one example.

Salt shakers.

In this modern fast-paced world, simple, and what works, and has always worked, is relegated to antique category and is therefore no longer acceptable, often ending up in garage sales and second hand shops.

New inventions influenced by modern tech, most usually with complex internal workings that require batteries and/or periodic charging, have all but replaced tools that simply stood at the ready to do a specific job. Like the now antiquated small glass container with holes in the lid that held already ground up salt.  

With a simple pick up and shake over a plate of food, added, without drama or a need to whack or stop to replace the batteries or clean off the battery connections due to corrosion, the tool for using the ancient ingredient that has always represented enhancing, adding onto and preserving does exactly what it was designed to do.  No muss no fuss. 

I cannot help but see a painful allegory to Matthew 5:13  as I continue to console myself that I am salt that has lost its savor.  Then I wonder if I am the salt or should I be the simple shaker that is always ready to do the job, however small and unnoticeable and un-modern?

Then Matthew 5:14 declares that we should be the light too because a town built on a hill cannot be hidden. 

So, at this age, I might be completely out of step in terms of the latest trend, but like an old fashioned salt shaker that can't stop me from doing what I was crafted to do. I keep on keeping on, pertinent or not to the here and now. 

So many things I can no longer do. But I can pray, I write and let God determine the relevance. In new, modern texting shorthand vernacular:

  

Be salty - stay lit. 

For Him,

Meema