WHO'S COUNTING

As a lady was leaving a party, she said to her hostess, "Those brownies were so delicious that I ate four." The hostess replied, "You really ate seven, but who's counting?" Sometimes we find ourselves very busy counting and calculating. T.S. Eliot's J. Alfred Prufrock said, "I have measured out my life with coffee spoons." Sometimes we are counting instead of living our life. We count— how much longer 'til I get off work; how much longer 'til I get finished shopping; how much longer 'til I get home; how many more dishes 'til I am through washing dishes. Yet we really only wash one dish — the one that is right in front of us. That's the only dish that we will ever wash. Animals realize this better than we do. They never become bored with repetition because they never count how many have happened or how many are left to go. We can release the need to count things, to keep score, and so fully enjoy this moment and whatever it brings as a great gift of life. When we count out our dance steps: one, two, one, two, we forget that life is a dance.