Letter No. 2: The Things We Leave Behind

I have a confession.

I notice shopping carts in parking lots. Not the groceries. Not the cars.

The carts.

Some people faithfully return them to the cart corral. Some leave them balanced carefully on a curb, perhaps believing gravity has agreed to finish the job. Others abandon them so creatively that I can only assume the cart has entered the federal witness protection program.

I don’t know why I notice these things. Perhaps it’s because shopping carts reveal something about us that has very little to do with shopping.

Every abandoned cart quietly says, “Someone else will take care of this.”

A week ago, I found myself thinking about that while running the Missoula Half Marathon. That sentence sounds ridiculous. I realize that. Life rarely asks permission before connecting unrelated ideas.

Every couple of miles, volunteers stood beside the course handing out paper cups of water and sports drink.

They smiled.

They cheered.

They encouraged complete strangers they would probably never see again.

The race was remarkably well organized. There was only one thing I couldn’t stop watching.

The paper cups.

Garbage cans stood just beyond every aid station. Not hidden. Not disguised. Not camouflaged behind shrubbery. Just twenty feet away.

Very few cups survived the journey from an outstretched hand to the garbage can. They flew through the air and settled across the pavement. Hundreds of them.

The volunteers didn’t seem surprised. Several of them carried rakes.

Rakes.

Apparently, enough years had convinced someone that ordinary cleaning equipment simply wasn’t going to get the job done.

I’ll admit…

Part of me became a little self-righteous.

“You know,” I wanted to announce between gasps for oxygen, “the finish line isn’t going anywhere.”

Fortunately, running thirteen miles leaves very little breath available for public lectures.

Then, somewhere between mile ten and the finish line, the paper cups stopped being about paper cups. They became mirrors.

Life has a way of showing us ourselves when we’re busy noticing everyone else. I may not leave many paper cups behind. But I have certainly left other things for someone else to clean up.

Conversations I should have started.

Apologies I should have offered.

Promises I intended to keep.

Encouragement I assumed someone else would provide.

Responsibilities I quietly hoped would solve themselves if I ignored them long enough.

Most of us would never intentionally make another person’s day harder. And yet, almost without thinking, we sometimes leave behind little things that quietly become someone else’s burden.

That’s why I keep coming back to ordinary moments like shopping carts and paper cups. Not because they determine whether someone is a good person, but because they quietly ask a deeper question.

When no one is paying attention…

When there is no applause…

When the easiest thing is simply to keep walking…

...who am I becoming?

Formation rarely announces itself in life’s grand moments. More often, it arrives disguised as an empty shopping cart. Or a paper cup. Or twenty extra steps. Or an apology. Or a phone call. Or a handwritten note.

The remarkable thing about formation is that it never really ends with us. Every decision leaves something behind. Sometimes encouragement. Sometimes relief. Sometimes another person’s burden.

Maybe that’s why I notice shopping carts. Not because I’m interested in shopping. And not because paper cups bother me all that much. I’m interested in the quiet decisions that reveal the people we are becoming.

Because every ordinary moment eventually asks the same question.

When I’m finished here…

What will I leave behind?

Until next Sunday,

George

If this letter reminded you of someone, perhaps send it to them.