Went and saw The Station Agent last night. Fabulous. It cleaned up at the 2003 Sundance Film Festival with Best Screenplay, Audience Award for Best Drama and others. The story line is great: dwarf moves to rural, small-town New Jersey. Wants to be left alone in isolation, but ends up developing strong friendship with 2 other unlikelies, but also loners. I’ve been reading Thomas Merton, and in his Thoughts on Solitude, he writes:
We must love our own poverty as Jesus loves it…We must love the poverty of others as Jesus loves it. We must see them with the eyes of His own compassion. But we cannot have true compassion on others unless we are willing to accept pity and receive forgiveness for our sins.
That is exactly what happened with these people and a few others in the small town of Newfoundland. They were seeing with the eyes of Jesus’ own compassion. And that’s something we all need to strive for…
Came home afterwards at midnight to a house w/o power. A storm had come through the Hagerman Valley and knocked all the power out, for about 12 hrs. Which isn’t a big deal, except when you’re out here, that means no water either b/c of the well, etc. So, no water pressure, no flushing…I was glad when I heard the power flick on at around 5am.