I blame my mom.

My parents don’t argue. Never have. Not really. They have discussions, but my dad actually can’t argue with my mom. No one can. How can you argue with a person who sees the best in everyone?

I remember many a backseat car ride, the winding mountain road pressing me tight against door and sister in turn, my brother graduating from car seat, to booster seat, to seat belt, our road dance accompanied by the oft-repeated soundtrack of the front seat. My dad offering a disparaging remark about the inconsiderate driver before or behind. My mom gently countering with one of her speculative stories.

Maybe that teenager just got her license today.

What if that lady’s passenger feels carsick?

Maybe that man’s in a hurry to get to the hospital.

This last scenario, the hospital story, I recall as the most common. Mom would paint a picture of the poor guy’s pregnant wife (lying down on the back seat where we couldn’t see her), deep in labor, urging him to ride the tail of the car in front of them. Insisting he scoot out for a less-than-polite, but necessary pass.

That baby wouldn’t wait.

My dad didn’t buy it, though. And neither did I. I was too smart to be taken in by what ifs and maybes.

***

I found my mom’s storytelling habit somewhat annoying, but it became infuriating when applied to my own encounters with mean or stupid kids at school.

The girl who grabbed my Oreos at lunch?

Maybe her family can’t afford cookies.

The boy who drew an ugly picture and put my name on the paper?

Perhaps, he meant it as a compliment and just hasn’t reached his full artistic potential.

I wanted sympathy when someone did me wrong. How maddening to be met with overt concern for the other guy from my own mother (who was, after all, supposed to be on my side).

But my mom honestly didn’t favor either side. Except for instances involving the Dodgers, she was the kind of person who genuinely loved a tie best. Still is. She wants everyone to win. It’s unnatural!

***

I grew into adulthood even less inclined toward Mom’s sunshiny view of humanity. Watching, hearing, or reading the news became an increasing exercise in frustration for me. Bad news, bad policies leading to more bad news, and a population of consumers too lazy or ignorant to do anything about it.

I became ever more solid in my commitment to promote right by exposing wrong. Seeing people realistically, I felt obligated to recognize and remark upon their flaws. (I did realize, I too, was imperfect, but what in the world do you suppose would happen if every speck-hindered person let those with logs run wild?)

One day in an advice column letter, I discovered a kindred spirit in the fight for a better-behaved world. Expounding upon the abuses of our overly-generous government programs for the “poor,” the letter-writer relayed her market day disgust upon observing a woman paying for a mountain of groceries with food stamps. A mountain that, my valiant friend vehemently pointed out, included a ridiculous $27 child’s birthday cake (and, mind you, this was back in the early 90’s!).

My own little family was then making do with minimal income, steadfastly refusing to apply for government assistance. If my kids could be happy with a $2.99 boxed cake mix prepared and decorated by their not-especially-artistic mama, why couldn’t the food stamp lady’s kids? Why should some people indulge in frivolous luxuries on the taxes of bare-bones hard-working folks like us?

The following week, I turned to my now favorite section of the paper and read a reply that, while I can’t remember the exact wording, has remained in my memory for three decades.

Last week someone wrote to you about a woman paying for an expensive birthday cake with food stamps. I’d like to explain. 

I was that woman. The cake was for my little girl.

The doctor doesn’t seem to think she’ll live to see another birthday, so I splurged on this one.

And just like that I went from outrage to sorrow. Those four sentences served as my mom’s unvoiced I-told-you-so and broke the confidence I once held in the infallibility of my well-informed perceptions. From that moment I grew slower to speak.

***

As methods progressed to deliver news and opinions with wiry speed and constant supply to my desktop and phone, I had to grow quicker to hear, too. And not just to hear, but to consider the possibility of story details that are perhaps, far more than a tweet can tell.

A short time ago, in the stormy months leading up to a contentious presidential election (anyone remember that?), I noticed the loudest voices of any particular political persuasions spoke with assumptions similar to my behind-the-wheel dad’s. Proclaiming only two possible explanations should anyone favor the candidate opposing theirs: evil or stupidity.

As I am privileged to know two people who don’t at all fit the description of the monstrous “them,” depicted in those social media offerings, I wondered what might happen if I brought my car and grocery store lessons to the table. What might I learn if I got out of the car, so to speak, and came to the perceived enemy with a meal and a couple of questions:

1. What is your greatest fear (should the other side’s candidate win)?
2. What is your greatest hope (should your own candidate win)?

My brother and his wife, despite their questionable political designation, are two of the most decent and generous people I know. People who politely refrain from bringing their minority opinions into our family gatherings and holiday celebrations, though we all know on which side of the ever more rigid U.S. dividing line they stand.

What we didn’t know was why.

So my husband and I came bearing food and the hope for a civil exchange where our stomachs and our gaps in knowledge might both be filled.

***

Our agenda was simple.

To listen and learn.

Not to bring them over to our way of thinking nor to be convinced of theirs.

Not to come to agreement, but to come to understand the hopes and fears that drove their mysterious political leanings.

In the conversation that ensued I learned there isn’t as great a difference as I’d imagined between the hopes and fears on the two sides of the table. Our concerns are largely the same. Concerns for how the actions of a wise or heedless leader might affect our stories as people who love our parents and children. People who sing happy birthday songs and light Christmas candles. People who enjoy a backyard barbecue and a Sunday afternoon stroll through the neighborhood. Our differences were not so much in what we identified as the threats to our freedom and safety as in their order of priority and the methods we believed would best protect and restore them.

Though I don’t believe any of us chose to cast a different vote as a result of our dinner chat, I came away from the evening feeling better about the country I live in and the people I share it with. Felt better for having focused more on hearing than on speaking and not giving anger a seat at the table.

***

Today, when I think back upon my dad angrily sharing the road with a rude driver, or the woman angrily sharing the grocery store with a greedy shopper, I wonder. Perhaps no real harm was done, but I wonder if perhaps some small good could have come from more grace-filled curiosity and less negative assumption.

Isn’t this what we saw in Jesus and his interactions with the “them” of His days on earth? Folks like the Samaritan woman and the woman caught in adultery? Though He surely knew the whole story, Jesus asked questions and listened to the answers. He, who truly has the power and knowledge to righteously condemn, showed a curiosity that invited conversation into situations and stories into the conversation.

***

I’ve been long familiar with the wisdom in James 1:19-20…

Know this, my beloved brothers: let every person be quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to anger; for the anger of man does not achieve the righteousness of God.

…but I’ve never found it easy. Even with a collection of humbling, eye-opening stories behind me, I still don’t find it easy.

It’s only when I remember to see every trying person in every enraging situation as a story in disguise, I now find it’s possible.

Thanks, Mom.

***

How about you?

Have stories had an impact on the way you look at people or situations? They can be your own or stories lived by someone you know or even found in the pages of fiction. No need to go into detail (unless you want to). Just throw a title into the comment section below. I’d love to know.