Every Afternoon after school we walk through the Park to get home. A large beautiful Park with benches strategically scattered around, peaceful and serene, well wooded and calming in its effect. It’s always a little treat for both of us. For me, a time to stop and reflect on all my goings of the day, the hustle and bustle of running a business, a little respite from the jarring effect of negotiating conflicting demands of the various business stakeholders. For my daughter, a recess from the relentless dodging of the feistiness at the playground, an escape from the gate keepers of good behaviour keeping a draconian watch on a child rearing to let loose and a relief from the unending competition from peers pretending to be better than others. Precious 30 minutes for both of us to sit on one of the benches and just be, not trying to prove anything to anyone, allowing the calm of the Park to wash off the agitations of the day and life in general, helping to restore balance.
There is a kind looking gentle man and his dog that we’ve noticed around in the park. He has warm eyes and easy demeanour. He gives a little nod and a half smile, it feels polite to return such an innocent and undemanding gesture. He never asked for more and we never offer more. Each of us gets on with the business we came here for, allowing the Park to bath our soul of the rigour of the day. We all continued our visit to the Park and do our doings. After a few months, one day the gentleman got a couple of sweets out of his pocket, unwrapped one, pop in his mouth and offered one to my daughter. There was a brief moment of hesitation and confusion. Should she? Should she not? Is he a stranger? Is he not? Is the sweet poisonous? Is it not? Will it be offensive to refuse? Will it not? Why was he offering? Is the gesture innocent? Is it not? Moreover we have been doing the little nod and half smile for a few months now. What is life without a little trust after all? Decision! decision! decision! She looked at me with a pleading look in her eyes, I had a split second to decide, all four eyes were on me now, this was harder than saying ‘no’ to George Clooney. In our usual communication mode, I gave a tiny nod, blink and you will miss it, with the approval signed, exchange took place, deal completed. I watched like a hawk afterwards, but she was neither sick nor troubled. She likes sweets anyway. With sweet giving ritual established, we got talking a bit, found out the gentleman lives with his dog a few street from the park, he lost his wife three and a half years ago. The Park was a favourite place for him and his wife and they would visit the Park every day, so he is just continuing the habit in memory of his late wife. The little sweet thing was just something they did together. Now that we know a bit of his story and where he lived, my guard was somewhat down. So he would share one sweet with my daughter, just one sweet every now and then. Sadly it became an expectation, the pattern had been set.
One day he stopped offering the sweet, he still came to the park, do his little nod and half smile. He now brings one sweet out of his pocket, pop into his mouth but stopped offering any. That was bizarre to say the least, it was clumsy to ask, ‘why did you stop’? We tried to ignore the change of attitude but the damage had been done, my daughter was heart broken, I offered to buy her sweets but it was not the same. She kept wondering what she did wrong. I knew she didn’t do anything wrong as I was always watching, she said her ‘thank you’s and all that. All I know is that when we give people the power to feed us, we also give them the power to starve us and when it suits them, they will use the power to starve us. ‘Why?’ you ask, it is just in the nature of the beast! So next time, ‘do we just say ‘no’ to sweet from the kind stranger?’ I don’t know the answer, the jury is still out.
We stopped going to that Park.
Beautiful Ivory 