Peace on Earth, Goodwill to All

[rj]

> [...] all those others day to day struggling with Us and Them...

... aah, Pink Floyd ...

... last minute shopping yesterday at Woolworths, bad Archons out in
force all over: obstructionist station wagons and trolley matrons in all
the byways and aisles; a swarthy man with a machete in the fresh produce
section hacking caulis apart with force right at the spot where the
mushrooms are; the single breakfast cereal I can eat relegated at last
to one narrow row in the farthest bottom corner of the shelves (and no
less than totally obscured by a pallet of cardboard cartons yet to be
unpacked to boot); and, at the register, a price check on the
double-smoked leg ham will conjure a leering aisle assistant from
seeming nowhere, her promptness uncustomary but more so especially at
this time of year, who just as promptly disappears back to the meat
freezer with it, neither ever to be seen again ...

So, it was with some pleasure and relief that my rounds of the aisles
were accompanied by one of the carpark trolley rescue boys, a former
student, Assyrian I think, who'd come here as a refugee from the Kurdish
lands with his brothers and sisters some four or six years ago. I taught
them all when they first arrived, six of them in the one class, and,
coincidentally, he was in my class again last year completing his senior
matriculation. He didn't achieve great results, of course, because of
his comparatively brief exposure to the language, wasn't particularly
studious either come to think of it, but he's working, and he plans to
do a photography course or something next year if he can get in ...

As we walked we talked about stuff: the season, the millennium, who
celebrates what, what time the store stays open till. We talked about
how well over half of the people on the planet haven't been counting to
2000 the same way the Western calendar has, and how presumptuous and
blinkered and self-deceiving it is to think that the Wrath of God is
about to manifest itself in a numerical accident of our own device. At
about the frozen peas, suddenly remembering that Ramadan has coincided
with Advent this year, and forgetting (or never really knowing) what
faith he was brought up in, I happened to ask him whether his family
celebrated "our" festivals or "theirs". It was a reflex of the language,
a slip of the pronoun, and I didn't even realise what I'd said.

He did, however. He told me he wasn't Muslim and then looked at me
squarely as I was reaching into the freezer for a container of Double
Choc Chip: "'Ours' and 'theirs'?" he asked, half a smile on his face,
not so much question as critique.

It made me very happy. Well worth the price of admission.

Greetings of the season to one and all.