Shari

I usually jump right in and don’t preamble a check-in, but this week is different. We lost a dear friend this week. It is cliché to suggest what someone “wanted,” but I knew Shari well enough to know she might tell me, “Oh, put your big girl panties on.” Then she’d be immediately embarrassed about saying panties. A well-lived life would only need to touch a fraction of the lives Shari touched. So, I’m pulling them up in her honor…

Shari loved her job, no matter what position she was in. She most loved training. A craft she perfected on the Training team but carried around everywhere. Shari's life was riddled with difficulties. Enough that if it were a movie, I'd be frustrated because the writers went over the top, and it became too unbelievable. She met every challenge head-on, with unwavering sweetness.

She confided a harrowing experience she'd recently had. I was being a miserable grump on her behalf. She stopped me and said, "Richard." Shari's voice was sweet and gentle, but she exposed just enough sharpness to get it when she needed your attention. "You just have to make a choice. There is a lot we can’t control. But we get to choose how we are."

She was filled with so much hope; she became the light that generated warmth in others. Shari had been out of the office for another surgery. Her physical structure wasn’t as kind to her as she was to us. She was excited to have a big cup of coffee. It was a large paper cup with a plastic vented lid. She was excited to show me a picture. She needed a free hand, so she claw-grabbed the top of the cup to set it on my desk. The lid buckled, and instinctively, she squeezed, which became the perfect amount of pressure to rocket-launch that cup downward. There was coffee everywhere. Whatever you've pictured, it was way worse.

Shari apologized for spilling coffee dozens of times from the day it happened and as recently as last week. The experience was one that deserved the movie narrator's voice-over: "Will he choose annoyance and frustration? Or will he choose the limitless kindness she always offers?" Limitless kindness may not do justice to Shari. Perhaps relentless kindness is more accurate. As we stood at the service for her father, who had just passed away, she kept checking to make sure our needs were met.

I don't get to choose my obstacles. I do get to choose my responses. I can let them weigh me down or allow them to sour me. Or I can choose The Shari Way. I can have whatever past is behind me and choose kindness right now. I can choose a disposition of strength that accepts the challenges and tackles them with the force of positivity and hope.

Can my experiences help me be a better teacher instead of just souring me? Will I borrow, until I adopt, Shari's warm hope? Can my resolve be the guide that keeps us moving forward?

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