scratched on my hand

Its five AM on a friday morning and in case you were wondering, this is when they vaccum the library. I have the remnants of four blog entry ideas scratched on my hand and have yet to sit down and actually write them. epic failure in communications, my friends. but, soon after my last blog entry I realized two very crucial elements of community:
1. community hits you when you're not seeking it and
2. you just can't make this stuff up.
for instance-- i had the perfect table picked out in the corner of a little rustic coffee shop in northern virginia. I just knew that this old and wonderful piece of furniture would provide a lovely time and an interesting story. all i got was an ear full from a jaded middle-aged man on the woes of the public school system. mind you, he picked the wrong girl to complain to about public schools.for the first time this semester, i might have actually looked interested in my stats book. and he had a lot of knowledge he hoped to impart about statistics as well.
but, i suppose that is the beauty in it. We can choose to intentionally seek community in our lives but we can't necessarily choose the parameters of where it will happen, with whom, and when. It just happens.
and why would we want it any other way?

about the same time something did happen though, unexpected and unplanned. i received a boatload of inspiration from a woman named Mariel.
The back story is that I have been doing quite a bit of house sitting lately.I find it hugely fascinating to get a look into other people's lives (and pantries, especially). Not kidding, some people have real Picasso's in their houses and elevators! Their dogs eat better than I do.
Enter the housekeeper.
On monday morning of this particular week I had a little overlap with this very woman. I had just been on a run in the pouring rain, walked the dog in the storm and lost the key when bending over to scoop the poop in a sea of the neighbors grass (found it!) and I sit down across the table from this woman, the housekeeper.
So my mom asks, what does a housekeeper even do all day if the family is out of town? She takes one load of laundry down the elevator and then she reads the newspaper, of course. For hours.
But i had a few wonderful moments of syrupy accented conversation. She's from 'the islands.' she takes three buses to get to this house. she moved here because she wanted her sons to have everything that she didn't have.
What did that mean actually?
Because the nine year olds in this house have i-phones and macbooks.
Education. She divulged to me all about her experience and family on the island, but what stuck with me was her uncompromising devotion to the fact that her chidren would have the opportunity to go to college. it was far from a possibility for her, but she changed her very life in order for them to have this gift.
So as I scoop ice cream with 2 bachelor degrees and almost 2 masters degrees, I have a bit more of a perspective on what it means to have both a job and an education. I also am gaining a greater sense of the sacrifices that parents make, for things that, to children, just seem like a given.

all that to say, hang tight, they are all scratched down and will come...