There is a standard joke where a Roman Catholic dies and goes to heaven. To his amazement, upon arriving there he finds that everyone else is there as well. Rendered speechless, he tries to mingle with his Catholic friends.
There are other versions of this joke where a Methodist (or insert Presbyterian, Anglican, Pentecostal, etc.) dies and goes to heaven. To her horror, she finds there the Roman Catholics alongside the Muslims! The Jews have their version of this joke —perhaps even atheists have a take on it.
I’ve been thinking lately that my life tends to mirror this Catholic joke. Let me explain what I mean.
When my wife and I first decided to get a dog it went something like this. We purchased a puppy and we began to train him. When I began to take the dog on daily walks, I saw many others who were also out on a walk with their dogs. Where had these people been before? Had we all purchased our first puppy at the very same time?
Shortly after my son was born we began to take him out on his stroller. Same thing happened. Whenever we would go out, we would meet other parents who were out with their kids on their strollers. What was going on? I was sure these people had never been in our neighbourhood before.
Long before retiring I fantasized about shopping at busy stores all by myself. With my day no longer following a rigid schedule I could go to the mall at dinner time or first thing in the morning when the store opened. But can you guess what I found? Groups of hitherto unknown and unseen individuals were there as well, regardless of the time I chose.
It would be ludicrous to suggest that hordes of dog walkers, parents and shoppers inexplicably began to stalk me. I suspect the truth has more to do with my awareness.
My lack of awareness, actually. It seems that as individuals we are prone to a disturbing type of tunnel vision. We follow established tracks. We get so busy that we do not notice others all around us unless suddenly we have something in common with them.
I find this concept fascinating. Life is so much broader than the small fraction we experience. We may be truly missing out.
Consider that the people who populate our city streets in the daytime are not the same people who come out at night. These 2 groups of citizens never meet. An individual in one group could only discover the other group if he changed his schedule. It’s as if we all lived in different cities simultaneously.
To sum up, the world is much bigger than we think. With greater awareness we can confirm that our experiences are indeed universal. Everywhere we go, someone has been there before.
*Note: the word catholic means “universal.”