Also see the thread MMario could not resist starting last night, Moosewood and MudCats.LOL!! I dared Hess to post that I burst into tears!!! No-- Susan, be honest-- I didn't dare her, I suggested it!! LOL!! Of course I was perfectly happy to see Little Hawk! How else could we have had a chance to pick on flattop??? I, of course, was discreet, having only praise to offer! And a BSEG!
Yes, we had a great time. I hummed a few harmonies with the cold I have keeping me from singing anything. Truth is, I couldn't think of any lyrics, with my fever getting up there, and all the LOL, till just before leaving, and by then we had pretty much done the music thing.
It was Hesperis who pointed out that the supposed "Proselytizing Praise" had sat through all of the talk on reincarnation without saying much. I had sat there... listening... thinking.... comparing what I heard to my own experience, listening.... wondering what is proselytization, and how is it best to respond to it... and wondering if they would notice I just listened.
They asked me why I had not interrupted or participated in the talk about spirituality. I responded that this is not the kind of thing I go into with people individually without some prior relationship having built a foundation for the farthest frontiers of thinking about these matters-- that foundation taking time to develop-- because a discussion with me will tend to go that frontier where they have been struggling or questioning or wondering-- and then blast out past that point. Unlike sharing what I have experienced and learned, as I often do in my writing, a personal discussion I am party to tends to focus on the other person, and the attention I bring to bear on that tends to move them forward in their own area of interest.
I also explained that evangelization is not where my spiritual gifts happen to lie-- that my orientation is to listen, to help, to offer good news about what is being shared with me, not necessarily good news about Jesus... and that what I have to share about my own spirituality is that what I had heard the others share is encompassed within my relationship with Jesus. And then we moved on.
As Hardi drove us home, I reflected on the realization that this had been a first meeting with Hesperis and Little Hawk and that we had only seen MMario a few times before, yet there had been instant communication, accurate joking, and joy. I thought back the few short months it had been since we had made our first MudMeet with MMario and Irish Sergeant. I remembered how excited I had been, before it, and how excited Hesperis had been the night before this meeting... and I hoped her first MudMeeting had been as glorious as mine. Her small sweet smile and dancing eyes, and the warmth and ease of the hug she gave me when we left, answered that question. I think you'll see all of that reflected in the pictures, too, on all of us.
I wondered, too, about the people sitting around us as the corner we first occupied alone got filled up with other diners, and then since we stayed so late, as they left and it was just the staff closing up. They must have thought we were all such good, good frieneds... assumed we had known each other a long time. They'd have seen people of different ages, genders, dress codes, personal habits, musical gifts, ideas.... tumbling all over each other in joy, joy, joy. It would have been the joy they would remember, I think.
Ya know in a romantic movie when the couple is dancing, smiling, late, oblivious to the closing routines of the staff, and the staff have that cute little smile as the couple finally notices they've closed, and they leave? It was just like that.
To wear and see that kind of smile... it is worth every flame, frustration, and foolishness we can experience in this amazing Mudcat Community. It's worth even more. It's certainly worth the drive to meet a Catter. The curiosity and joy, the way people can't WAIT to get their hands on each other in person-- it carries away everything else.
I recommend this experience. I want to have it next with someone I don't agree with at all, and see what changes. I want to have it with someone who thinks I am the devil incarnate, whatever that means to them, and see what happens, or with someone I feel that way toward, if I can think of anyone that way. I want to see if that all gets carried away. Any takers?
Hesperis, god bless your sweet beautiful soul for bringing this about, my dear sister in the heart.
~Susan