“Aussie, did you see the bluebirds at the feeders?”

“Don’t bother me, I’m looking for an escape route out of here.”

“We don’t often see bluebirds here, but these arrived in mid-February. I think they’re scouts; they will probably fly off after taking a rest here.”

“What are we, an Airbnb? I hope you charge them: hotel, food, water. And stop talking to me about bluebirds. You think I’m ignorant because I came from Texas and voted for the Man? Because I’m black? It’s true, I never attended any of the fancy colleges around here, but at least you know I’m not DEI.”

“Aussie, some of the top people in government attended prestigious universities. Trump went to Wharton, Elon Musk to University of Pennsylvania, Vance was in Yale, and –“

“Yes, but they did it the right way.”

“What way is that, Auss?”

“They were outsiders! They hated the teachers, they hated the other students, they hated the lib courses. They learned all the right lessons by being outsiders.”

I understand the sympathy and even admiration that outsiders get. I felt like an outsider till I started Zen practice with the Zen Peacemakers over 40 years ago, and even during those years I occasionally felt like an outsider, not just out of consensus with others but also out of sync, as if the world was dancing one dance and I was dancing another, partnerless and alone.

In our culture we admire mavericks, people going solo and following their own dream. We often have to leave the mainstream to experiment, try something new, follow our own path, question basic assumptions, unsettle rather than settle.

I went a different way from the one followed by members of my religious Jewish family and their world. One Sabbath morning, accompanied by a Canadian friend and wearing jeans and sandals, a cash-carrying pocketbook swung over my shoulder, I ran into a friend of the family in his Sabbath finery, wearing a suit and hat. “Does your father know what you’re doing?” the man asked.

My parents suffered through many years of my stepping away and adopting the persona of the rebel. “You always have to be different,” was my father’s constant refrain. “Nobody else acts like you.”

At 5 am this morning I drove my housemate, Lori, to surgery in Springfield. It’s the first of two that she will undertake to restore her ability to walk. I witnessed the superb care she got. We were told of a woman who, after fusion of bones in her foot, continued to pursue her dream of running a marathon in every single state of this country. Two of the nurses had had extensive orthopedic surgery themselves, and there they were, professional and deeply caring.

Since we came in so early, I noticed two Latino workers washing the stair floors, finishing their night shift. I saw some children eating breakfast at McDonald’s on their own, the older one hurrying the others because they had to get to school. Waiting in my car for Lori to be wheeled out of the building after surgery, I saw various families—black, white, brown—emerging from the adjacent pediatric surgery wing. I saw a thin, black man limping as he pushed a young child in a stroller across the parking lot. I watched an elderly Asian couple board a bus, he holding on to her small, narrow shoulder.

So much of my rebelliousness has melted off over the years; I don’t feel that kind of pride anymore. I may have once walked out of my immediate family (and one way or another, always returned), but I could never walk out of this big family, whose members struggle to find some miniscule home on this big, lonely planet. I am part of this family, no wish to be the outsider, no wish to fight or do battle. It served once, got me where it got me, and now I’m a full-fledged, full-hearted member.

A long nap in mid-afternoon was interrupted by two friends bringing soup, meatloaf, and flowers for Lori. The Illegal Chihuahua was ecstatic, assuming everyone came to play with him. And why not? Generosity spread across the house like a cool spring breeze, with yellow daffodils and tulips that we put in a purple vase.

Lori keeps on apologizing for all the trouble she’s put me through this past year. How can I explain to her how “all this trouble” has melted off my residual resistance to life, the remnants of the Eve-vs.-the-world mentality. Because my heart has fractured so many times, I now have many more hearts than I’ve ever had before.

“Don’t tell me you’re going to beg again. What a schnorrer you are.”

“I just want to ask readers to support this blog, Aussie. I haven’t asked since December. Some people donate monthly, others once in a while, and way more others don’t donate at all. I don’t charge, Aussie, I just ask.”

“Is begging the only way I get my Turkey Yumm Sticks?”

“Sometimes. There’s social security and gifts, too, but I also need help from blog readers to get you your Turkey Yumm Sticks.”

“Okay, beg away.”

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