Glove

Officer Molly Solverson is a Minnesota police officer on the TV show Fargo. Her buttery, sweet upper Midwest accent has an aw-shucks, folksy charm. She has caught on that a suspect is lying and is going to get away with it. She shares a powerful parable.

“There’s a fella once, runnin’ for a train, and he’s carrying a pair of gloves. He drops a glove on the platform, and he doesn’t notice.

Later on, inside the train, he’s sitting by the window, and he realizes he’s only got this one glove left. But the train has already started pulling out of the station.

So what does he do? He opens the window, and he drops the other glove onto the platform. So that whoever finds the first glove can just have the pair.”

Sometimes, out of spite, frustration, or anger, I hang onto that other glove. Sometimes, out of defiant disbelief in the situation, I hang onto that glove. Sometimes, just so I can have something to mourn, I hang onto that glove.

Why not accept it? I can leave us both with a single useless glove. Or I can let go so someone can use them.

Am I angrily hanging onto a single glove? Am I kindly offering the companion to the new owner? What am I holding onto that I should let go?

Be curious, be kind, be whole, do good things.