A warm day in Sonoma County, I swam with the older gals and met a very bright, elegant, lovely nurse who took a break from her job in the middle lane this morning. She seems like someone who was destined to be a nurse and lucky are the patients who find themselves within her care. She seemed sincere, dedicated and full to the brim with enthusiasm for her tasks. She swims, as I am sure she walks the halls of hospital, as a graceful woman with her future all ahead of her.
I then went off to do some volunteer gardening at a Quaker inspired retirement community that I have come to love and admire. I work for a man who came to New York a few years ago as an immigrant from Europe and now works tending a sweet seven acre, landscaped campus with his coworker. They hold down the fort at this retirement community and it is a constant effort. He was a diamond cutter in his native country and now says that he sweeps the streets of America.
Everyone has a story that crosses my path and I am one of those people who like to ask and then listen. This has been my calling in life and people want to be seen and to be heard. I feel fortunate when my comrades on this planet share something that is deeply true for them. For the man I worked for today, his skills that traveled to this country outweigh his current job. However, he holds a jewel in his rugged heart and it is very easy to see the twinkling stone if you pause and care enough to watch the sun catch its' facets.
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