COMMENTARY: How an aimless dog, a 'Do Not Eat' sign and a ripped bumper sticker helped Elissa Ely find her way back to empathy:
We found the sign because we were lost; a situation that occurs more often than I might wish. The dog is convinced she has directional gifts, but I happen to know she is almost always wrong. She starts down one path, I disagree, she insists. As a result, we are often lost.
We bushwhacked our way to the edge of a lake. There was a sign by the water; a collaborative message from the Department of Public Health and the Department of Environmental Protection. It was written in English, Spanish and Cambodian, above a drawing of a plated fish with silverware. The fish had an alarmed look in its one eye, and a menacing “X” had been drawn through it.
Someone had pasted a sticker on the back of the sign. One edge was torn off, but the rest was readable. It looked like it might be more advice.This is not quite correct. Many of us are not floating in space, but deliberately and literally losing ourselves, as a form of escape. We are in escape from our own animosity, rudeness, storms of judgment, rages on and off the roads, and the growing realization that too few in this world are willing to share it peaceably with others.