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paul’s letter

December is around the corner. It gets crazy at that time of the year. If we let it. The commercials on television almost seem to demand that we buy, buy, and buy some more; All in the name of that word called joy. A joyous this and a joyous that – if we buy. Every year seems more intense than the last. I was scanning the book shelves of a very important person in my life, and came across THE LOVE BOOK by John Randolph Price www.johnrandolphprice.com . If ever you need to sit quietly and simply restore yourself this coming month you might want to consider doing it with this book. On page 17 is Paul’s letter to the Christians at Corinth. I forgot how beautiful it is. In case you’ve missed seeing it recently, here it is:

“If I speak with the eloquence of men and of angels, but have no love, I become no more than blaring brass or crushing cymbals. If I have the gift of foretelling the future and hold in my mind not only all human knowledge but the very secrets of God, and if I also have that absolute faith which can move mountains, but I have no love, I amount to nothing at all. If I dispose of all that I possess, yes, even if I give my own body to be burned, but have no love, I achieve nothing.
This love of which I speak is slow to lose patience-it looks for a way of being constructive. It is not possessive: It is neither anxious to impress nor does it cherish inflated ideas of its own importance.
Love has good manners and does not pursue selfish advantage. It is not touchy. It does not keep account of evil or gloat over the wickedness of other people. On the contrary, it is glad with all good men when truth prevails.
Love knows no limit to its endurance, no end to its trust, no fading of its hope; it can outlast anything. It is, in fact, the one thing that still stands when all else has fallen.”

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those east broadway buses

On Thanksgiving Day my daughter, Emi, and I boarded an Apex bus scheduled to leave at 1:30 pm at East Broadway – at 2:15 we still hadn’t left, and none of us knew the reason, including the driver. Finally a Chinese employee entered the bus, and when someone asked what happened to our 1:30 departure, she said, “1:30? No problem. We leave 2:30.” And off she went.

At 2:30 we were told to change buses; a more patient group you haven’t met. Bags came down from the racks, coats, and reading materials were collected and we all walked across Division Street to another bus. The reason for the delay seemed to be . . . a secret, no answers to questions were forthcoming. At 3pm we departed; it was a smooth ride to Baltimore. The Baltimore Travel Plaza was the destination for a few of us. When we arrived there the bus stopped by the roadside to let us off and quickly left. It was cold and windy and no shelter was in sight

I tried to confirm our return by phone, but couldn’t get any information, so we went with the time given when I bought the tickets in New York. We stopped by the same cold, windy, isolated roadside and waited for the bus. A bus was waiting but it wasn’t Apex. The driver motioned for us to get on. We did, presented our tickets, and were told Apex bus had left and we needed to pay an extra $20 each. A nearby passenger chimed in to say that he had the same ticket and paid the $20. We said, No thank you, we would wait for the Apex bus, and that it couldn’t have left, we still had time. The passenger who paid asked for the return of his $20 and got off the bus with us. Three Chinese bus employees followed us off the bus. There was a mini conference. My daughter’s ticket and the other passenger’s ticket were reexamined and they asked to see mine. I don’t know what new information was extracted in those few seconds, but we were told to get back on the bus at no additional price. We three looked at each other and boarded the bus again.

In the town of Delaware the driver stopped for more passengers, and as we started to drive away we all heard a banging noise underneath the bus. We left and could hear the driver speaking Chinese on the phone. He stopped the bus three times and went outside to try to repair the problem. All to no avail. Very slowly we inched our way along the highway keeping closely to the right. When we got to NJ we were told another bus would be coming. We waited 45 minutes for the bus. Again we were an unusually patient group. The bus came. We collected our possessions and boarded  another bus. The rest of the trip went smoothly. And I suppose that was all to be expected because when you pay $35.00 for a round trip bus ride from Manhattan to Baltimore you take your chances. But, then again, if Fung Wah can do it right, why not the others?

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“The man who is truly good and wise will bear with dignity whatever fortune sends and will always make the best of his circumstances.” -Aristotle

“. . . The trick to being a good adventurer, of course, is to take all such surprises in stride. Good people keep walking whatever happens, taught the Buddha. “They do not speak vain words and are the same in good fortune and bad.” – Vagabonding by Rolf Potts
www.rolfpotts.com

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thanksgiving dinner in baltimore

We, my youngest daughter and I, like to travel to Boston from Manhattan on Fung Wah bus www.fungwah.com . It makes for interesting travel and we pay all of $60 round trip for two. Fung Wah leaves from Chinatown. No rules and regulations. Just show up, buy a ticket, board the bus and away you go. Fung Wah has given its all through the years to find a place in the bus world. Now they’ve moved from Chinatown in Boston to a spot at South Station. It’s very convenient.

This year Thanksgiving dinner for us is in Baltimore, Md. And to get from NYC to there my daughter found a similar mode of transportation to that of Fung Wah in the form of Apex Bus. Hooray! To make sure all is as it should be, I took a dry run by way of the F train to East Broadway to find Apex Bus. I walked two blocks to where number 88 East Broadway should be, and there it was. Well, that’s not quite how it happened. I walked two blocks from the subway station passing many Chinese stores. I back tracked a few times, looking for 88 East Broadway, and finally ducked into what looked like a mini mall. There stood a traffic cop. I told him I couldn’t find 88 East Broadway. He smiled and said, “Come on.” (I’d found a good guy). Around the corner were a few bus companies with their buses lined up and Apex was the last of them-across Division on Forsythe Street. Before reaching the Apex, the workers for the other bus companies tried to convince me to travel with them. They were very aggressive. But I stood my ground, and finally got to Apex. I saw a Chinese woman with tickets in her hand standing on the sidewalk next to the buses. Her English was limited; my Chinese non-existent, but her big smile was beckoning, and there was enough communication to purchase two round-trip tickets to Baltimore for $70.

Time to go to Chelsea Market at 75 9th Avenue www.chelseamarket.com . Chelsea Market is one big building for food buying. Everything needed for tonight’s dinner, for entertaining, or for a quick meal, is there. Everything. And it’s all really, really delectable. I’m thinking dessert for Thanksgiving Day, and for this occasion, Fat Witch Bakery, buonItalia, Manhattan Fruit Exchange and Sarabeth’s will be perfect.

“Dare yourself to play games with your day: watch, wait, listen; allow things to happen.” -Rolf Potts
www.rolfpotts.com