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Summer Speedos | Field Notes: Long Grass · Neighbourly: Real Stories of Care and Community

• 0:05
  Welcome to Summer Speedos from Neighborly, our short in between season
• 0:09
  series, while Shannon takes a break from her regular interviews. I'm
• 0:13
  Johan, the producer of the show. Some episodes are field notes recorded
• 0:17
  outside in ordinary places where care actually happens. Others
• 0:20
  are story field notes, more cinematic reflections that start with a story
• 0:24
  from history or real life. Either way, we're paying attention to the small,
• 0:28
  ordinary ways care, faith, courage, and community show up around us.
• 0:32
  So grab a cold drink or head out on that bike ride, walk or hike.
• 0:36
  Enjoy this year's edition of Summer Speedos from Neighborly.
• 0:46
  Hey, everyone. I was out on another walk today. We've got kids
• 0:49
  biking around, people walking, staring at me
• 0:53
  funny because I'm holding a microphone in the park. But you
• 0:57
  know what? You got to talk to someone. And sometimes you got to talk to
• 1:00
  something. Anyway, on my walk today, I walked past
• 1:03
  this lawn that immediately made me feel very
• 1:07
  responsible and, quite frankly, very
• 1:10
  judgmental, which is a terrible combination. It
• 1:13
  wasn't a disaster. No wildlife preserve signs? No
• 1:17
  child lost in the grass. Not that I know of. But it was
• 1:21
  long enough that my brain quietly opened up a case file. Why
• 1:24
  haven't they cut that? Is the mower broken? Are they away?
• 1:29
  Don't they care? Is anybody even living here? And
• 1:33
  then, because my brain is efficient in all the wrong ways,
• 1:36
  it started filling in the story without permission. That's the thing
• 1:40
  about a lawn. It can look like a yard issue, but it
• 1:44
  can also become a character assessment if you're not careful.
• 1:48
  And that's where I caught myself, because I had no idea what
• 1:52
  was actually going on. Maybe someone was sick.
• 1:56
  Maybe someone was grieving. Maybe the person who used to
• 2:00
  cut it isn't there anymore. Maybe they're working long hours
• 2:03
  and the lawn has become the one thing they can't get to.
• 2:07
  Maybe the mower broke and the budget is already tight.
• 2:11
  Or maybe they simply hate mowing the lawn, which,
• 2:14
  honestly, I can't fully understand. To me, it's a peaceful
• 2:18
  pastime. And it's fun because lawns are basically
• 2:21
  outdoor carpets. But the point is, I
• 2:25
  don't know why the lawn was uncut, and I was still ready to write
• 2:29
  a story. Now that feels important, because we do this with
• 2:33
  people all the time. We see one visible thing.
• 2:36
  A messy yard. A sharp tone, a missed
• 2:40
  message, a late arrival, outside appearance. Maybe a
• 2:43
  child melting down in public. And we start narrating from the
• 2:47
  outside. But dignity asks us to slow down
• 2:51
  before we simplify someone. Curiosity says
• 2:54
  there may be more going on here than what I can see from the
• 2:58
  sidewalk. That sentence alone could save us from a lot of
• 3:02
  bad conclusions. Judgment is fast.
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  Compassion is much slower.
• 3:10
  Judgment fills in the blanks. Compassion leaves some
• 3:13
  blanks unfilled long enough to ask better questions. I
• 3:17
  need people to do that for me, too. There are parts of my life that
• 3:21
  probably look confusing from the outside. Things I meant to do
• 3:24
  but didn't. Things I delayed, things I
• 3:28
  forgot, things I overthought so long they somehow
• 3:32
  became historical artifacts. I want people to be
• 3:36
  merciful with those gaps, which probably means I need
• 3:39
  to practice the same mercy when I see someone else's.
• 3:44
  There's a line in Scripture about mercy over judgment. I
• 3:47
  like that because it doesn't say mercy ignores reality. It
• 3:51
  says mercy gets the final word. Mercy
• 3:55
  doesn't mean the lawn does not matter. It means my first
• 3:58
  response does not have to be the verdict. Maybe the neighbor with
• 4:02
  the long grass needs a hand. Maybe they need privacy.
• 4:07
  Maybe they need a text that says, hey, I'm doing my yard
• 4:10
  later. Want me to run the mower over to yours too?
• 4:14
  Or maybe they need nothing from me except the dignity of not being reduced
• 4:18
  to one thing I noticed on a walk. So this
• 4:21
  week, pay attention to the place your mind writes the story
• 4:25
  to quickly. Maybe not the lawn. And when it
• 4:29
  does, pause long enough to ask what might
• 4:32
  I not know that one question can turn
• 4:36
  judgment into compassion? And sometimes that is
• 4:40
  where care begins. That's the field note.
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  Keep noticing.
• 4:55
  Sa.