Food Stains and Price Tags
C.J. Dennis has an extended poem called Jim Of The Hills that's really worth the read (if you're a poetry person). Our hero worked in a logging factory and was hard at it when the boss came around with a group of visitors explaining things to them. None of them got a second glance from Jim except the one that took him by storm and set his mind reeling. In fact he was so taken with her that he clumsily tripped and banged his shin. The mortified Jim puts it this way:
Next thing I know the boss is there, an' talkin' fine and good, Explainin' to the visitors how trees are made of wood. They murmur things like "Marvellous!" an' "What a monster tree!" An' then the one with sunlit hair comes right up bang to me."I saw you fall," she sung at me: you couldn't say she talked, For her voice had springtime in it, like the way she looked and walked. "I saw you fall," she sung at me, "I hope you were not hurt?" An' suddenly I was aware I wore my oldest shirt.
That's a hateful lovely experience, isn't it? There he is in all his glory and there you are with the sales ticket still hanging from the sleeve of your sweater. There she is tantalisingly near, your heart's beating like a bass drum; your speech is wise and sophisticated while bits of your sandwich are hanging on the side of your face. Oh the horror of it all. In your shame that's close to stupidity you hope she didn't notice.
It's silly but it's fine to be so taken by someone that for them you want to be at your best in every way. Some of the old comedy movies let us in on the experiences of those who innocently show off for the one they're nutty about and we like it. There's something really nice about someone becoming so important to you that you want to run faster, jump higher, look slimmer and all the way round to be more attractive for.
And we aren't so sunk in our sin that we don't every now and then feel deeply disappointed in how we look in God's presence. We feel grubby and shabby and wish we could bolt from his presence. It isn't even dramatic enough to say with Peter, "Depart from me, Lord, for I'm a sinful person." The experience isn't that shattering but it may be more dangerous for all that. It's a despondency, a sense of well, yes, grubbiness. As if we were going through life with dirty collar and cuffs on our shirt or a blouse with a button missing and food stains on it.
It's all right to want to shine. It's okay to want to impress. Well of course it can be overdone but it's nothing to apologise about. It's as much a comment on her or his warm desirability as it is on your own wants. We want to please those who please us, or at least, we don't want to disappoint them and in that lies love's power to transform us for the better.
©2004 Jim McGuiggan. All materials are free to be copied and used as long as money is not being made.
Many thanks to brother Ed Healy for allowing me to post from his website, the abiding word.com.