Saturday 16 February 2008

Voices in my head

Today was a beautiful, blue-sky Spring morning. Worthy of a visit to our favourite playground and park. We packed up a picnic, scooter and tricycle and headed off. On the way I dropped in to Starbucks to pick up a coffee to take to the park. I always feel a little jealous when I see someone at the park with a cup of coffee in their hand, so I thought it only fair to reciprocate.

We arrived at a crowded Herbert Park and played for a good while in their great playground. Then we took off for a scoot followed by a little picnic and even had time to feed the ducks. It was ideal.

Almost.

I say almost, because as I wondered around the swings and slides, sipping my latte and enjoying the sounds of fun, I was quite shocked to see a considerable amount of rubish strewn across the ground - and this in one of Dublin's poshest areas! A voice in my head said, 'How can people leave a mess like this?' Then I heard it say, 'Do the decent thing and clean it up yourself.'

So I began with the larger pieces of paper, whch looked like some child's homework, then moved on to the sweet wrappers and crips packets. I imagined I could hear voices saying, 'Wow. Look at this man. He must be a Christian, for behold his attitude of graciousness. See how he inspires us to acts of humble service for the betterment of the community!'

As I progressed to picking up the remaining trash I noticed that no one had actually joined me in my mission. On my last stretch I bent over to pick up some tissues only to discover that this wasn't what I was aiming for. But it was too late. I had made the commitment in my movement to pick it up. I couldn't let Jesus down now. What kind of witness would I be? I had to follow through.

Ladies and gentlemen, this was not a tissue from some snotty-nosed toddler. I could have dealt with that much better. No, this was a used breast pad from some lactating mother.

It was then that I thought I heard the voices in my head saying, 'And that is why we were quite happy to leave the rubish where it was.'

22 comments:

Ali said...

Good for you! I hope you'd eaten your picnic before you ... :-s

My parents are in Dublin this weeked, I shall contact them immediately and tell them to visit Herbert Park immediately to see it in all it's glory.

PS the Ulstermen have a new boss and are back on track :-)

Cosmo said...

Tell your folks to come back in the summer - Herbert Park is glorious then, though I can't guarantee about the state of the playground if they were also wanting to enjoy that!

I thought abuot you the other day as I drove passed Donnybrook and was amazed at the transformations going on. Do you ever come south to watch the rugby? (Speaking of which, if we'd just kept playing pick-and-drive at the end of the game last week I'm sure Ireland could have beaten France.)

By the way, I haven't commented on your great St Pat's prize giveaway as I thought it would be a little unfair if my name was drawn...Plus I don't drink whiskey and I'm sure you wouldn't want it to go to waste!

Ali said...

One at a time then:

(i) we travel to Dublin on a regular basis to see away matches, tho this year our away fixture against Leinster was on Boxing Day, not a good day for travelling South due to family committments.

(ii) which eejit was it that kicked the ball out in the last second?? The money up here is on BO'D or Murphy - one thing is for sure, it wasn't the token Ulsterman ;-)

(iii) in the words of Mrs Doyle: go on, go on, go, on! Sure with Day-na's multiple personalities all appearing you've little chance of winning anyway. Personally I don't care what you do with the whiskey if you win, I don't drink the stuff myself, but I use it in Christmas Cake and some of the recipes from the Avoca cookbook, yum yum!

Have I covered everything ...?

Nancy Mon said...

I think you gave a cup of cold water by picking eveything up. That was a very nice thing for you to do.

Cosmo, you need to post more. I love reading your blog.

Cosmo said...

Thanks Nancy for your kind words. If been pretty busy over the last couple of months with some study, so any available time should have been used on the computer for that. (Not always the case though!)

Hopefully I'll get a chance to write with a little more frequency soon...and then baby numer three is coming...

jsi said...

Yes - no one else got Adriana!! (Or at least those who commented had nothing to say about it.)
Juxtaposition was exclusively fate, my Shakespeare really was in the pile I had next to the fireplace as I was reading. Book #1, #2 and #3 were all less than 123 pages.
I can't help but say I was very impressed with how well it applied itself to the post already in the throes of composition.
And...
There are no severed fingers arond here.

Good for you in cleaning up the park...but, a used nipple napkin, AUGH! Its enough to make you search through your pockets for some hand sanitizer or getting a diaper wipe or something.
Yet truth be told, that was probably the least filthy piece of trash you could have picked up, but the thought of it all just gives me the willies!
Glad your February day included a park visit and a picnic. It sounds glorious!

RYC...can anyone really ever have too many books? HMMMMM

jsi said...

Yes, Camp Neosa. Chapel in the Trees carries a certain plaintive peace when seeing Leesville Lake in the moonlight as the snowflakes quietly fall.

Pluto said...

Way too much information, Cosmo!

Wallace said...

That is too funny! Fair play to you for doing it! I'm headed into Galway for a coffee right now... I'll drink it in your honor.

Nick Coke said...

Thought you might want a record 10th comment! Looks good on the stats. So there it is...

Cosmo said...

Pluto,

It was way too much rubish!

Walace,

I raise my next latte right back at yer.

Nick,

It is nice to have a bunch of comments - however, half of them are mine!

Nice to see some comments being added to your blog too.

Ali said...

Hey Cosmo ... had to have a coffee at the Odyssey Arena when we were there for HSM on ice - they had no tea! They had no milk either, so not only was I forced to drink coffee, but black coffee ...

My advice, should you ever be there, is don't!

KayMac said...

My goodness, you had me laughing. Here is my own version of your experience http://praisemycreator.blogspot.com/2006/03/witness-2-holy-crap-batman.html

Thanks for stopping by my blog, via our mutual friend Dave. BTW, I have friends that hail from Dublin...they are currently planting a church in Galway...Discovery Church.
http://www.discoverychurchireland.com/

Cosmo said...

Kay,

I actually thought your story was going to be worse. I imagined you were going to reach under the car to get the battery only to discover something else! Putting your foot in it didn't seem so bad after that!

Dana said...

Well I am way late to get in on the fun comments but I will put mine in the hat anyway.

Good for you. I find myself doing the same thing at a lot of places. Litter is a pet peeve of mine.

And I don't have multiple personalities...just multiple friends with personality...

And, and I agree with Nancy, looking forward to more posts!
:)

Snot Head (a.k.a Kylie) said...

Oh my...what an experience...:S

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