May 18, 2021 - I’ve been loving going to the new City Hall Park in Burlington. It’s so great, and Dewey loves it, too, because he always meets new dogs, and people, when we go there. Yesterday a little dog came up to us to say hi - funny little dog. Then the woman who owned to dog came over and we talked for a bit. She then went off with her dog and met up with some other people. She came back a few minutes later with a suitcase and a laundry container with some clothes in it. She set it all down on the patio near me, and then went back to her friends. When she left the stuff she looked around a little bit, just to be sure she could leave it there. Lots of times at coffee shops people will ask random neighbors to watch their computers while they go to the bathroom…taking care of each other. So, I felt that way about her stuff and figured I’d watch over it.

After her stuff was there for about 10 minutes, one of the people who hangs out in the park a lot started looking through the stuff. Obviously it wasn’t his stuff and he was thinking of stealing it, so I told him, “Hey, that’s not your stuff.” He asked me if I was sure, and I said of course I was sure, so he walked away.

I looked over at the woman who left it there, and she was paying no attention to the stuff, she was just hanging out with her friends. I stayed in the park another hour or so, as did the woman who left the stuff. She was paying no attention to it. What I recognized is that she wasn’t coming back for it…it actually was there to be taken. I realized that I read the whole scene. It became obvious that the guy who was looking through the stuff was actually right, it was his stuff. It was left there for him, or anyone else who needed it, to take it. I’d totally read the scene wrong.

It brings up a perfect sutra from The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali (book 4, sutra 15):

“Due to differences in various minds, perception of the even the same object may vary.”

Isn’t that the truth. :-)