The Staples Delivery Guy

As I was working in my office at school, Sara, our department secretary, had to run out and pick up our new Spanish honor society's charter. It was being framed to hang next to the English honor society charter in the department. She ordinarily signs for deliveries, but since I was the only one there, I got to sign for a couple of packages.

The delivery guy asked about summer school and why they're weren't more people around. I told him that most of the classes are in the morning, and that we only have one more week in the first of two 4 week summer school sessions. He asked what I was teaching, and I told him a literature class. He asked what we were reading. When I told him we were working through poetry right now, his eyes lit up, and he went on to tell me about poetry's influence on his life. He quoted the first few lines of Robert Frost's Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening and related it to his father's death. I told him we had just read some Frost in class this morning.

Then, he went on to tell me about reading Hermann Hesse while he was in school and asked who I enjoyed reading. I mentioned that recently I had been interested in Billy Collins's work. (If you're interested in checking out Billy Collins, several of his poems have been animated as part of his goal as U.S. Poet Laureate of getting poetry into the lives of young readers. They can be found on YouTube. Forgetfulness is one that I enjoy and have used in classes.)

Finally, he asked me if I had read Dostoevsky or Tolstoy. I've read some of both and a collection of Tolstoy is actually sitting with a bookmark in it on the floor near my nightstand. He mentioned Dostoevsky's The Idiot and explained how the impact of those around Prince Myshkin pushing him into madness has always stuck with him. Some could use what happens to Myshkin as a way of justifying withdrawing from society especially if we hope to retain our goodness and innocence.

As the Staples Delivery Guy was explaining how writing is his way of withdrawing from the influence of those around him, I decided to ask him if he had ever done anything to get his writing out there for other people to read. He kind of bristled at the idea of letting people into the intimacy that we often feel with our own writing - a struggle I can understand.

I am also reminded of something Rob Bell relayed during a session at Calvin College's Festival of Faith and Writing that I attended in the mid-April. In reference to his writing, speaking, and even during interactions with friends and neighbors, he said, "I want to be the one who starts the conversation rather than always trying to have the last word." I need to work on getting the words out - whether they are written, spoken, or communicated through my actions - to start conversations.