The Human Condition

Now there's a grandiose title for a blog post that will be read by perhaps three people. (Who is reading this thing anyway?  Send me an email and tell me sometime.)

It often happens in the wintertime, when I have the opportunity to be part of lots of things that are not related to vegetables, that I find myself in the midst of human drama.  Generally not my own drama, but certainly I am connected to it in some way.

It sort of amazes me how much effort it takes for any organization to continue to function smoothly.  I am not talking about money or resources, I am talking about people getting along with each other.  It is a huge issue.  I guess the groups I am a part of are not top-down, hierarchical structures, but I am willing to bet that those organizations have plenty of drama too.

Without getting into any detail that would cross boundaries of confidentiality, most of my volunteer meeting time these days seems to be spent talking about how things are going at the temple.  They are not going very smoothly at present.  Certainly I can take some responsibility for this since I was closely involved in the selection of the people who are currently having so much trouble.  Oy.  It is really hard to know how things will go when you hire people, I know that from lots of experience.  But when you add in all the earnest lay leaders who are trying to keep things going (and spending countless hours at it, as always), it can be quite a pickle.  There are so many egos to account for.  People have so much history of their own that they bring to the conversation, even the very best of them/us, and it makes everything so complicated.  There may be nothing more inherently complex than running a congregation whose budget is dependent on voluntary dues, who hires talented clergy to lead itself, who has a Board of Trustees that is made up of well-meaning volunteers, and AS ALWAYS, the purpose of the organization is to perpetuate itself. The good times are so short-lived!  There is always a new wrench that gets thrown into the machinery.

In addition, I am about to have a phone call with my partner Ellen. Her birth family (the people she grew up with, I mean) is just coming apart in all directions.  People are having such a hard time with health, relationships, their children.  Ellen herself is in a good place right now but she needs to figure out how and if she can help her mother, her brother, her sister, her other brother.

Perhaps this is why we like funerals and weddings so much. They are our chance to focus on the purest moments of the human experience.  In deference to what is big and compelling (not much is more compelling than death), we let the chaos of daily life slide into the background for a bit so we can celebrate or cry together, and feel grateful.

But always there is more to contend with, at least when you are middle-aged and deeply engaged in a number of different communities/families/groups.  It takes so much work to keep all these boats afloat, so to speak.  Certainly it is easy to see why some people choose to excuse themselves from this sort of work.  But no matter what, everyone benefits when society is functioning well.  It is ridiculous to imagine that we can all be curmudgeons and hermits.  Someone has to keep trying to build relationships and maintain them so that the curmudgeons can have somewhere to live, somewhere to go, somewhere to be welcome when they need us.

And that is my current take on the human condition.  It is a lot of work to keep things going so we can all enjoy being humans together.