Don’t take it to your grave

My father had the ability to talk to anyone anywhere. Color, status, clothing, education or religion meant nothing to him. He valued each person. He would endlessly embarrass me, calling me over to meet some stranger with whom he had struck up a conversation.

All the difficulties we have now connecting across differences has got me thinking back to lessons from my father. For one thing, he was curious. He asked people about themselves. As a businessman in the same town for decades, he got to know many people well. They would tell him about themselves as he looked at whatever watch or piece of jewelry they had brought in for repair. He was trusted. Trust doesn’t build easily or quickly. It can also be shattered.

The suburban New Jersey town in which my family’s business was located was not far from Philadelphia. It was founded by Quakers and retained a strong Quaker influence. They had their own private schools and a beautiful colonial-era meeting house. My father admired the Quakers’ dedication to education and peace initiatives. He sometimes went to Quaker meetings. He knew they were not perfect.

There was a Quaker cemetery at the corner of the street where our store was located. One day, when I was spending the day at the store with my dad, he suggested a path that cut through the cemetery on our way to the bank. This was intentional on his part. It was his object lesson of the day. “Why do you think there aren’t any graves right here?” he asked. “So we can take a nice walk in here?” was my guess. “Not at all,” he replied. He proceeded to point out that descendants of one founding family were on one side of the path and descendants of another family were on the other. These peace-loving people who had followed William Penn to this area of the country for religious freedom had maintained a generational feud so long that many succeeding generations refused to be buried next to each other!

I don’t want that to happen to us in this town, in this county or in this country. My fear is that without hard work on our part, it will.

In his book, “The Way Out,” Dr. Peter Coleman says that since the late 1970s there has been a growing dynamic of toxic polarization that has run off the rails and has taken on a life of its own. I find this very sad and at times, frightening. It is also self-destructive because we need each other whether we like it or not. Humans are hardwired for community, says Sebastian Younger in his book, “Tribe.” Independence is a myth that has hurt us. The epidemic of loneliness exacerbated by the pandemic and social media have shown this to be true.

I hope we can regain a willingness to be curious about each other. One way to begin is to ask someone to tell us about themselves, asking questions only for clarification and understanding. No challenges. No debates. No politics.

The post in “DailyOm” for Nov. 8 reminded me of some of the early lessons I learned from my father. The gist was that everyone has a story to tell — if we take the time to listen. The reflection asserted that “… each person learns lessons, makes choices, and develops a unique perspective, which only they can claim and share. When we take the time to ask questions and listen, we find that every person has a fascinating story and an utterly unique perspective from which to tell it.”

Now that the election is over let’s put our energy into getting to know each other so that we avoid the path of hostility and resentment that divided the Quakers.