Live Slow

They were friends of long duration.

You could see that in the handshake which lingered longer than greeting required. Their mutual gaze betrayed a lifetime of shared experience. Unrestrained smiles communicated absolute acceptance.

One lived between two 90° turns in the county road that wound its way through the rural community between their respective homes. The other would catch a glimpse of his friend at the mailbox or on the porch as the well worn pickup crept through the turn. Like a horse that already knows and anticipates the way, the vehicle had a habit of turning off the paved road and easing into the dirt drive.

I’d find them there on occasion, leaning against the pickup bed, engaged in conversation. They might be talking about when to plow and plant the wheat, or if there was time to get the hay cut and raked before the next rain, or when the cows were expected to birth their calves.

Theirs was a language born of a love for the land, the blessings it supplied, and a way of life in many ways incomprehensible to this city boy. The earthiness of it all was no less intriguing for my substantial and manifest ignorance.

The temptation to abandon errands, pull over, and spend a few minutes with the pair was strong. I resisted the urge mostly out of reluctance to intrude.

Their roadside meetings were unscheduled and conducted with no apparent agenda. There was no set time for adjournment. You’d see them there, engrossed in neighborly camaraderie.

Both were content to let the conversation meander between them and to follow where it led. While speaking freely and fully, important matters had a way of becoming clearer. Life had a way of setting its own agenda. The effortlessness of it all left me envious.

They seemed to understand better than most that wasting a portion of the day together creates a place where good things have a chance to happen. The time they shared was not an expendable commodity.

The rapport between them was born of days traveling through the best and the worst life offered. They watched families and the community grow up together and grew closer in the process. Tragedy and hardship only served to strengthen the bond between them. In a time of need you could depend on one being there for the other.

Business was conducted on the side of the road with a promise and a handshake. Commitments made while looking a man in the eye with his hand in your grasp are free of the kind of loopholes that legal contracts contain.

The necessities of friendship were more compelling than the differences between them. They worked diligently to preserve the relationship because it meant more to them than being right or nursing a grudge. Challenging one was a mistake unless you were prepared to take on both. Opposing points of view didn’t keep them from being allies.

At times they’d engage in conversation about politics or other controversial topics. Each asserted their separate convictions and went home to carefully consider the other’s point of view. Experience and a powerful respect for one another demanded no less.

Both friends are gone now. Some would say that the day of investing generous amounts of time and effort on a neighbor’s behalf passed on with them. There’s little use in grieving the demise of that which is no longer practical. That was then. This is now.

But not me.

When driving past those two sharp turns, the friends who met between them come to mind. Memory testifies that there was a time when life moved at a slower pace. People took time to stop and talk. They grew together and the things that matter became clearer.

And somehow, life was richer for the time invested in those unscheduled meetings with no set agenda and no set time for adjournment. Our unwillingness to pause and connect with one another on some meaningful level is just another way of saying that we don’t have time to live fully.

From time to time I pass the place where friends paused and conducted the business of life. It's a way of life worth preserving. A vow is made to never forget what was learned from their example.

Live slow.