While driving back and forth over the three or four blocks along my regular route to and from my father's senior retirement village in Florida, I noticed a lone piece of sod in the very center of a busy intersection. The drivers here in Boynton Beach are extremely impatient and always in a very great hurry, like red ants. They honk their horns at the slightest delay if the light turns green. A bit of a shock for me from the more or less courteous drivers in Tennessee, bumbling down the road with a dog or two in the back of a pick up truck.
Somehow this lone clump of grass in the middle of the intersection plunked down on the hot asphalt was pleading to me to be rescued. Why I became so determined to rescue it was a bit of a puzzle to me. After all it is just a clump of grass. But I thought, the poor thing it must have fallen off one of the gardener's trucks. But this intersection was extremely busy and dangerous. A four-way traffic light with six lanes on all sides. And drivers like red ants.
What to do? I tried to just forget about it. Silly me. Sentimental. But I had to drive by it several times for over a week and every time it rained, it appeared to be losing more and more of the dirt it must have had with it when it fell off the truck.
I studied the intersection and tried to run out to get it. But it was way too dangerous. Then I thought, "I'll bet Sunday morning early there won't be so many cars. I have just the place for it near Tulsi devi in the back of the house."
In the back of my mind I sensed Krishna was going to show me something. But what? I couldn't imagine. I studied the intersection and devised a plan of how to dart out into the very center of the intersection without getting hit by the cars.
I saw my chance. Trowel and plastic tray in hand, looking like a complete lunatic I made a run for it, as much as I am running anywhere anymore in my late 60's. There I was ready to rescue the living entity who had fallen into such misfortune. Trowel in hand I reached down to scoop the sod up to take it to its new home near Tulsi devi.
To my great surprise the sod didn't want to go with me. I got the distinct impression that it became overcome with fear and anxiety at my presence. It was not at all as I had thought. He hadn't fallen off a truck. Actually there was a hole in the asphalt and the grass was very happy growing there. It was his home. He even had neighbors, some weeds of some sort or other. They were all living quite happily there in the middle of the intersection growing out of a hole in the pavement with cars whizzing by on all sides 24/7.
I understood Krishna's lesson here and maybe, why I had to become so fixated on saving this clump of grass:
First of all, I can not save anyone, not even a clump of grass. My so called efforts at saving someone are actually a disturbance.
Second, my thinking about a situation and the way I may see something will be faulty. My perceptions are limited to my understand.
Third, there is no loss in any endeavor even if it fails to achieve a certain result if it is done in devotion and with the intention of serving the Lord. The result of devotion to God is love of God and that does not depend on success or failure.
Attempting the path of Love of God makes one seem foolish sometimes and one's activities may not be understood by others. Silly or crazy. Oh well. I can only laugh. Love makes fools of us all. One way or another.