No greater love

He was driving home one evening, on a two-lane country road. Work, in this small mid-western community, was almost as slow as his beat-up Pontiac. But he never quit looking. Ever since the Levi’s factory closed, he'd been unemployed, and with winter raging on, the chill had finally hit home. It was a lonely road. Not very many people had a reason to be on it, unless they were leaving. Most of his friends had already left. They had families to feed and dreams to fulfill. But he stayed on. After all, this was where he buried his mother and father. He was born here and knew the country.

He could go down this road blind, and tell you what was on either side, and with his headlights not working, that came in handy. It was starting to get dark and light snow flurries were coming down. He'd better get a move on.

You know, he almost didn't see the old lady, stranded on the side of the road. But even in the dim light of day, he could see she needed help. So he pulled up in front of her Mercedes and got out. His Pontiac was still sputtering when he approached her.

Even with the smile on his face, she was worried. No one had stopped to help for the last hour or so. Was he going to hurt her? He didn't look safe, he looked poor and hungry. He could see that she was frightened, standing out there in the cold. He knew how she felt. It was that chill that only fear can put in you. He said, “I'm here to help you ma’am. Why don't you wait in the car where it's warm. By the way, my name is Joe.”

Well, all she had was a flat tire, but for an old lady, that was bad enough. Joe crawled under the car looking for a place to put the jack, skinning his knuckles a time or two. Soon he was able to change the tire. But he had to get dirty and his hands hurt. As he was tightening up the lug nuts, she rolled down her window and began to talk to him. She told him that she was from St. Louis and was only just passing through. She couldn't thank him enough for coming to her aid. Joe just smiled as he closed her trunk.

She asked him how much she owed him. Any amount would have been all right with her. She had already imagined all the awful things that could have happened had he not stopped. Joe never thought twice about the money. This was not a job to him. This was helping someone in need, and God knows there were plenty who had given him a hand in the past. He had lived his whole life that way, and it never occurred to him to act any other way. He told her that if she really wanted to pay him back, the next time she saw someone who needed help, she could give that person the assistance that they needed, and Joe added “...and think of me.”

He waited until she started her car and drove off. It had been a cold and depressing day, but he felt good as he headed for home, disappearing into the twilight.

A few miles down the road the lady saw a small cafe. She went in to grab a bite to eat, and take the chill off before she made the last leg of her trip home. It was a dingy looking restaurant. Outside were two old gas pumps. The whole scene was unfamiliar to her. The cash register was like the telephone of an out of work actor, it didn't ring much.

Her waitress came over and brought a clean towel to wipe her wet hair. She had a sweet smile, one that even being on her feet for the whole day couldn't erase. The lady noticed that the waitress was nearly eight months pregnant, but she never let the strain and aches change her attitude. The old lady wondered how someone who had so little could be so giving to a stranger. Then she remembered Joe.

After the lady finished her meal, and the waitress went to get her change from a hundred-dollar bill, the lady slipped right out the door. She was gone by the time the waitress came back. She wondered where the lady could be, then she noticed something written on a napkin. There were tears in her eyes, when she read what the lady wrote. It said, “You don't owe me a thing, I've been there too. Someone once helped me out, the way I'm helping you. If you really want to pay me back, here's what you do. Don't let the chain of love end with you.”

Well, there were tables to clear, sugar bowls to fill, and people to serve, but the waitress made it through another day. That night when she got home from work and climbed into bed, she was thinking about the money and what the lady had written. How could she have known how much she and her husband needed it?

With the baby due next month, it was going to be hard. She knew how worried her husband was, and as he lay sleeping next to her, she gave him a soft kiss and whispered soft and low, “Everything's gonna be alright, I love you Joe.”

Mundo maravilloso

Mientras escuchaba las noticias en la radio el otro día, decidí que era tiempo de seguir el consejo de Louis Armstrong. Era tiempo de hacer un ajuste de perspectiva. Así que hice un cambio mental de los inquietantes informes al suave sonido de Michael Buble, y recordé la grabación del clásico de Louis “Satchmo” Armstrong, “What a Wonderful World” (Que mundo tan maravilloso). ¿Viene a tu mente el origen de las palabras conforme las lees?

            Veo árboles verdes, también rosas rojas.

            Las veo florecer por mi y por ti.

            Y me digo a mi mismo, que mundo tan maravilloso.

            Veo los cielos azules y las nubes blancas,

            El bendito día brillante y la sagrada noche oscura.

            Y me digo a mi mismo, que mundo tan maravilloso.

“What a wonderful World” fue escrito especialmente para Louis Armstrong por George Weiss y Bob Thiele, ya que Armstrong quería grabar una canción en celebración de los gozos ordinarios de la vida diaria. La pieza salió al mercado en 1968, durante un periodo cargado de disturbios raciales y políticos. Satchmo quería que quienes lo escuchasen recordasen lo que él siempre trató de recordar —“qué mundo tan maravilloso”.

            Los colores del arco iris tan bonitos en el cielo

            Están también en los rostros de la gente que pasa.

            Veo amigos dándose un apretón de manos, diciendo “¿cómo estás?”

            En realidad están diciendo “te amo”.

            Escucho a los bebés llorando, los veo crecer.

            Están aprendiendo más de lo que se imaginan.

            Y me digo a mi mismo, que mundo tan maravilloso.

            Sí, me digo a mi mismo, que mundo tan maravilloso.

A través de los años la canción se ha convertido en una de las más populares y cada vez que otro artista la graba descubrimos algo nuevo que nos llama la atención. Hay quienes piensan que la versión de Louis Armstrong es la mejor de todas. Otros juran que es la forma como Willie Nelson la canta, o Eva Cassidy. Siempre me ha gustado la forma como Iz la incorporó al principio de un potpurrí que empieza con “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” (En alguna parte más allá del arco iris), una versión que ha sido muy usada en películas y en la televisión. Hay incluso una grabación estilo rock-and-roll por Joel Ramone de esa canción. Pero mi favorita es la del cantante canadiense Michael Buble.

Después de las tragedias de 9/11 esta es una de las canciones que fue puesta en la lista de canciones que no se deberían de tocar en las estaciones de radio. Pero, ante la gran calamidad, pronto volvió a estar en el aire —no porque ignora las malas noticias del mundo, sino porque nos pide que pongamos nuestra atención en el futuro y nos asegura que el futuro está pleno de maravilla, gracia, afecto humano, crecimiento y posibilidades.

En mi mente la letra de la canción está basada en las palabras de Isaias 43:18, 19 que proclama: «Olviden las cosas de antaño; ya no vivan en el pasado. ¡Voy a hacer algo nuevo! Ya está sucediendo, ¿no se dan cuenta? Estoy abriendo un camino en el desierto, y ríos en lugares desolados”.

Estas palabras fueron escritas cuando la nación israelita había experimentado una trágica pérdida de vida y propiedades, cuando habían pasado por guerra y cautiverio, cuando habían vivido con el chasqueo y el desconsuelo de cada día. Esas palabras nos piden que lo hagamos de nuevo y las palabras de “What a wonderful World” nos piden lo mismo.

He aquí una premisa llena de gracia: Dios continúa trabajando en nuestro mundo y en nuestras vidas. Cuando abrimos nuestros corazones para ver y oír, cuando experimentamos su gracia, esta fluye a nuestras vidas de maneras inesperadas. Algunas veces se manifiesta en un pequeñito rayo de luz. Algunas veces es la luz del sol, que llena el firmamento. Algunas veces es la pequeña voz en nuestro corazón y algunas veces es como un trueno. Algunas veces es como oír a Louis Armstrong cantando “What a wonderful World”. Puedo oírlo cantando ahora mismo.

Ragman

by Walter Wangerin, Jr.

                  I saw a strange sight. I stumbled upon a story most strange, like nothing my life, my street sense, my sly tongue had ever prepared me for.

                  Hush, child. Hush, now, and I will tell it to you.

                  Even before the dawn one Friday morning I noticed a young man, handsome and strong, walking the alleys of our City. He was pulling an old cart filled with clothes both bright and new, and he was calling in a clear, tenor voice: "Rags!'' Ah, the air was foul and the first light filthy to be crossed by such sweet music.

                  "Rags! New rags for old! I take your tired rags! Rags!"

                  "Now, this is a wonder," I thought to myself, for the man stood six-feet-four, and his arms were like tree limbs, hard and muscular, and his eyes flashed intelligence. Could he find no better job than this, to be a ragman in the inner city?

                  I followed him. My curiosity drove me. And I wasn't disappointed.

                  Soon the Ragman saw a woman sitting on her back porch. She was sobbing into a handkerchief, sighing, and shedding a thousand tears. Her knees and elbows made a sad X. Her shoulders shook. Her heart was breaking.

                  The Ragman stopped his cart. Quietly, he walked to the woman, stepping round tin cans, dead toys, and Pampers.

                  "Give me your rag," he said so gently, "and I'll give you another."

He slipped the handkerchief from her eyes. She looked up, and he laid across her palm a linen cloth so clean and new that it shined. She blinked from the gift to the giver.

Then, as he began to pull his cart again, the Ragman did a strange thing: he put her stained handkerchief to his own face; and then he began to weep, to sob as grievously as she had done, his shoulders shaking. Yet she was left without a tear.

                  "This is a wonder," I breathed to myself, and I followed the sobbing Ragman like a child who cannot turn away from mystery.

                  "Rags! Rags! New rags for old!"

                  In a little while, when the sky showed grey behind the rooftops and I could see the shredded curtains hanging out black windows, the Ragman came upon a girl whose head was wrapped in a bandage, whose eyes were empty. Blood soaked her bandage. A single line of blood ran down her cheek.

                  Now the tall Ragman looked upon this child with pity, and he drew a lovely yellow bonnet from his cart.

                  "Give me your rag," he said, tracing his own line on her cheek, "and I'll give you mine."

The child could only gaze at him while he loosened the bandage, removed it, and tied it to his own head. The bonnet he set on hers. And I gasped at what I saw: for with the bandage went the wound! Against his brow it ran a darker, more substantial blood—his own!

                  "Rags! Rags! I take old rags!" cried the sobbing, bleeding, strong, intelligent Ragman.

                  The sun hurt both the sky, now, and my eyes; the Ragman seemed more and more to hurry.

                  "Are you going to work?" he asked a man who leaned against a telephone pole. The man shook his head.

                  The Ragman pressed him: "Do you have a job?"

                  "Are you crazy?" sneered the other.  He pulled away from the pole, revealing the right sleeve of his jacket—flat, the cuff stuffed into the pocket. He had no arm.

"So," said the Ragman. "Give me your jacket, and I'll give you mine."

Such quiet authority in his voice.

                  The one-armed man took off his jacket. So did the Ragman—and I trembled at what I saw: for the Ragman's arm stayed in its sleeve, and when the other put it on he had two good arms, thick as tree limbs; but the Ragman had only one.

                  "Go to work," he said.

After that he found a drunk, lying unconscious beneath an army blanket, an old man, hunched, wizened, and sick. He took that blanket and wrapped it round himself, but for the drunk he left new clothes.

                  And now I had to run to keep up with the Ragman. Though he was weeping uncontrollably, and bleeding freely at the forehead, pulling his cart with one arm, stumbling for drunkenness, falling again and again, exhausted, old, old, and sick, yet he went with terrible speed. On spider's legs he skittered through the alleys of the City, this mile and the next, until he came to its limits, and then he rushed beyond.

                  I wept to see the change in this man. I hurt to see his sorrow. And yet I needed to see where he was going in such haste, perhaps to know what drove him so.

            The little old Ragman—he came to a landfill. He came to the garbage pits. And then I wanted to help him in what he did, but I hung back, hiding. He climbed a hill. With tormented labor he cleared a little space on that hill. Then he sighed. He lay down. He pillowed his head on a handkerchief and a jacket. He covered his bones with an army blanket. And he died.

                  Oh, how I cried to witness that death! I slumped in a junked car and wailed and mourned as one who has no hope—because I had come to love the Ragman. Every other face had faded in the wonder of this man, and I cherished him; but he died. I sobbed myself to sleep.

I did not know—how could I know?—that I slept through Friday night and Saturday and its night, too.

But then, on Sunday morning, I was wakened by a violence.

Light—pure, hard, demanding light—slammed against my sour face, and I blinked, and I looked, and I saw the last and the first wonder of all. There was the Ragman, folding the blanket most carefully, a scar on his forehead, but alive! And, besides that, healthy! There was no sign of sorrow nor of age, and all the rags that he had gathered shined for cleanliness.

Well, then I lowered my head and, trembling for all that I had seen, I myself walked up to the Ragman. I told him my name with shame, for I was a sorry figure next to him. Then I took off all my clothes in that place, and I said to him with dear yearning in my voice: "Dress me."

                  He dressed me. My Lord, he put new rags on me, and I am a wonder beside him. The Ragman, the Ragman, the Christ!