MyFace

A vision has been granted to me of the day and the manner of my death.

I’ll die in Mill Valley, California. At the corner of Miller and Throckmorton. In front of Coppa Coffee.

I’ll be standing at the curb, waiting to cross over to the Depot Bookstore. I’ll look to make eye contact with the driver at the stop sign waiting to make a right turn onto Miller, in front of me.

She will be a slim young blonde in a silver Lexus SUV. She will look right at me. Reassured, I’ll begin to step off the curb. As I turn away from her, I’ll glimpse the beginning of an expression of annoyance on her face. Her mouth will begin to move. As I turn away, just as my right foot hits the street, I’ll have a microsecond of realization that she never really did see me. She was absorbed in her cell phone conversation.

I’ll begin to raise my left hand reflexively to signal her but it’ll be too late. She’ll wheel the SUV around the corner. My left foot will be caught under the right front wheel. I will go down. Then the right rear wheel will catch my legs and flip me over so that I watch the SUV pulling away.

Lying on the ground in the last moment of my life, I’ll look up and see her child, in the back seat, staring curiously at me. I will notice that the child has a bagel in his mouth. I will realize that I cannot tell if the child is male or female. A yellow Labrador retriever in the screened off rear section of the Lexus will bark furiously at me for a few seconds. The child will say something. I will see the driver waving, dismissing them both. She will drive on down Miller Avenue.

A crowd will gather. The fire truck will arrive quickly from the station around the corner. But it will too late. I will be dead, my blood running into a drain with a sign stenciled on it “NO DUMPING - FLOWS TO BAY”.

Half an hour later the driver will be arrested at the Whole Foods deli. Her husband will put up bail immediately. She will be released in time for her appointment with her personal trainer.

She will be charged with vehicular homicide. Her husband will hire a pit bull lawyer. She will state that she thought she had run over the curb. The charges will be reduced to a misdemeanor. She will spend a day at traffic school.

end

Appreciation is one of those qualities, a virtue really, that has to do with relationship. That makes it less abstract, more real. Of course all virtues have to do with relationship in some way. Anyway, I can deal with appreciation.

Appreciation is low key. You might say it is an unappreciated virtue. It is different from honoring or complimenting. It locates the action in the appreciator while still focusing on the appreciated. It is a statement of one’s own feelings.

It is easier to accept than a straightforward compliment. It does not make the appreciated person self-conscious like it might if you said you were inspired by them or how wonderful they were.

The trick of appreciation is to not ascribe a virtue to the appreciatee.

It does not exist as a judgment, as something separate from you, it does not have that force. It registers simply as the expression of a positive reaction.

(I do understand that appreciation can apply to other things besides human beings, like nature.)

Appreciation is effective in changing the attitude of the person doing the appreciation.

“It is twice blessed. It blesseth him that gives, and him that takes.”

Instead of asking, “Why aren’t you happy?,” you might ask, “What do you appreciate about your life right now?” Or the day, or your environment, or a person in your life.

You don’t have to go whole hog in appreciating. You can single out a small part of a situation or person, but if you say you especially appreciate something, that also implies that there are other things worth appreciating too. It kind of spreads out the appreciation effect. I call that “appreciation radiation.”

When you claim to appreciate something, you are implicitly stating that you have good taste. Or maybe that you have confidence in your own taste. But it does not acquire the weight of judgment. It is a kinder, gentler positive assessment.

“I appreciate the difficulty of the situation you are in.” That has a different quality than “I understand the difficulty…” Don’t you think?

This is the appreciation cycle: observe, respect, assess, acknowledge. Repeat.

I appreciate that I am done writing now. I appreciate that you have read this far. The word “appreciate” has now lost all meaning to me.

The end of appreciation.