The Universe Provides: Treasure Found at a Flea Market

Image via Wikipedia

It’ Sunday morning.  I am in sweats. A bandana covers my unshowered hair.  I desperately need to run; be on the trails working through my thoughts in cathedral quiet woods, but my kids have other plans.  Let’s go to the flea market, they beg.  It’s the last one for the season, they say.

It is not hard to convince me to visit the local flea market.  I love the real world experience it offers; the colors of life retrieved from old vans and set out on wobbly tables.  Where else can you view smiling people with sparse teeth and lung-tugging coughs selling discontinued toiletries and Barbies with missing feet? It’s the perfect venue for practicing negotiation skills. We let the kids decide whether to haggle or not.  They are spending their own money so every penny counts.

As we disembark the mini-van onto the bowling alley parking lot, I look up and note the dark finger-like clouds creeping in from the sky’s perimeter.  I still plan to hit the trails after the flea market sojourn.  It has been a scattered and emotionally draining week. I fear it will rain and I’ll miss out on the peace of a solitary run.

I am not looking for anything in particular so I leisurely browse the haphazard rows.  Like hunting dogs, my kids run off in different directions and then intermittently return to drag me to see a chubby baby-doll in a bright red dress or two live bullets for a 22 rifle. They seek out game and treasure. I notice the beautiful objects that appear in front of me.

I notice the geologist’s table is missing again this week.  Only once this summer, were we privileged enough to absorb the mystery and enchantment of his heavily burdened table of crystals, gems, minerals and plain old rocks. It was an education to stand near the space of  the bearded scientist with the lush wavy hair and listen to him explain the history and geographical origin of each crusty formation. Selling bits of nature. I personally was intrigued by the lavender and periwinkle fluoride crystals. My nine-year old son was blown away by the 400 million year old fossilized squid. There is something extraordinary about holding a creature or substance from a different age in your hand.  It is akin to viewing stars in a vast ink sky.  You are small but bone-deep connected to something enormously grand.

My sons, Bryce and Josh, forage for subjective prizes, while my daughter, Anna, and I are left to our own experience.  We come upon an attractive booth with billowing scarves tied to its frame.  Unlike the other vendors’ booths, this one is selling new items.  There are braided headbands made of vibrant fabric, stocking caps made of touchable yarn and a few trays of smooth acrylic jewelry.  Anna is immediately drawn to the colorful acrylic rings.  There are yellows, fuchsias, purples and reds.  Each has a painted daisy or the word LOVE encapsulated within its translucent material. Anna is afraid to ask the man with the kind eyes and handsomely weathered face how much the rings cost.  I inquire.  They’re a dollar each, he answers.  I notice he has a complete smile and is wearing one of the homemade stocking caps.

Anna slips a dark pink ring on her middle finger and promptly decides she would rather have a different one.  She goes to remove the pink ring but finds it snuggly gripping her finger.  She pulls and twists and pulls and twists.  The ring hugs tightly.  Anna looks at me with slightly alarmed eyes.  The vendor with his warm timbered voice says, It’s OK sweetie.  I bet they have some oil at the concession stand you can use to get it off. I’m not worried. Anna continues to work at the ring.  I suggest pushing it back and then up again.  Still stuck.  Again the kind voice offers an option, Why don’t you put some saliva on your finger to help it slip off.  Again Anna’s eyes look to me for approval.  Is it really OK Mom, to lick a ring I don’t even want or own?  She tells the gentleman she does not want that ring.  He still insists she use her saliva (note- he did not use the word spit) to loosen the ring.  Anna hesitantly licks her finger and maneuvers the ring off.  The man tells her to set the spit- covered ring down on the fabric covered table and choose another ring.  He doesn’t even flinch when he picks up the slimy ring to rinse it off.  Kind Gentleman praises Anna as we pay for a new clean ring.  He says, She has a strong character.  Most kids would have panicked when the ring didn’t come off.  He continues with, I obviously have children.  You just have to keep them calm.  

With his spacious presence this man gave Anna and I a priceless gift.  A sense of inner-stillness that penetrated the crusty layers of everyday fretting and frustration.  I feel as if I have just completed a spiritual run through sun-kissed woods.

I thank the man with my voice and my eyes.

As we re-connect with the boys and everyone shares their new treasures (an 1888 Indian penny and a pocket hatchet for Josh and Bryce respectively), I realize that although I was not looking for anything, I found exactly what I needed – a gentle and calm presence to connect me with something enormously grand.

When was the last time a stranger showed you kindness?  How has the Universe unexpectedly provided for you?