Expand your universe
We gazed at the animals caged at the Brookfield Zoo, many of their homes no larger than 3’x4’.
Their universe was the size of their cage home. As far as they knew, life consisted of the dirt, water, plants, and stones which surrounded them. Life was just that, nothing more.
Some people live just like those captive animals, unaware of the vast universe outside their cage, outside the boundaries of their universe. They live in cages they built themselves — cages built out of fear or loneliness or ignorance or arrogance.
There’s a big world out there.
That’s why I like taking the kids to Chicago. They need to see beyond the cage of their small-town universe.
They need to see the man dancing in the street, oblivious to the hundreds of people walking by.
They need to see women of other faiths, their bodies covered completely in black cloth except for their eyes.
Even the train ride had its lessons — the woman who complained because her company didn’t appreciate her work, the man who tried to sign me up with a telephone pyramid company, the man who didn’t pay for a ticket and was taken off by the authorities.
They need to wait an hour for a bus which never came to understand the life others live every day.
They need to watch in sympathy as the homeless man lay crumpled under a tree in the park.
They need to see the very rich and the very poor for they are all part of us, a part of humanity.
We put ourselves in cages we build ourselves when we fail to recognize and embrace the rest of the world which moves outside the glass barriers of our universe.
It’s more than just understanding other cultures and religions and careers. Sometimes, it’s understanding the people right next door, or across the isle in church, or in the next row at school.
It is never good to be the center of your own universe. Expand yours. Embrace all that life has to offer. There is good in everything created. Just find it.
