Uniqueness
“While human beings often manufacture identical products, according to Jewish tradition, God created each human being to be entirely unique. Whether or not you buy the theology here, you can appreciate the sentiment: There has never been anyone else like us and there never will be, and we each have a unique contribution to make to the world.”
8 NIGHTS, 8 JEWISH VALUES: REFLECTIONS FOR CHANUKAH ON THE JEWISH OBLIGATION TO BUILD A BETTER WORLD” –Sarah Hurwitz
Here, Sarah Hurwitz gives us a gift which is both encouraging and provocative.
Our uniqueness is a gift which is precious indeed, but which also comes with responsibilities and obligations and callings uniquely our own. Even as we acknowledge and celebrate our shared humanities, our shared common story, our shared house, our collective path as we walk, still we are at the same time invited to examine, appreciate, and live out our individual histories and callings. We are not made in an impersonal factory, with one big machine stamping hundreds of millions of widgets at a time. No. We have been lovingly crafted. One by one by one.
I think I mentioned this before: In my bedrooms, and in the hallway and kitchen and so very many in the workshop, Mr. Oakes made built in drawers. They look the same at first glance, but they are not; each one is just a bit different from the others. You won’t notice till you pull them out to paint or clean behind them. Then, the drawers you only thought you could put back easily and mindlessly become a puzzle of sorts; you have to remember which drawer precisely fits each opening.
The differently cut spaces ensure that each drawer has only one cutout which fits. I used to laugh ruefully at his lack of standardization (and how many beers he consumed as he worked his Sawsall), but now, twenty years later, I see them with new appreciation. They’re bespoke! Just like the house itself.
Each drawer is made by hand, not cut from a machine. Each made with his daughter, Lucy Shaver, in mind as he cut and nailed and sanded. Now, these quirky, singular, individual drawers are mine to steward. Now, I see, more and more every day, the love in the house he made for his daughter and her family. And for a woman–me–whom he never met but who every day enjoys the fruit of his labors.
We’re bespoke too. It’s like Mr. Oakes made us each in his workshop. He made the cutout hole slightly different for each of us, and made a drawer for each of us alone. The cutout holes are our lives; the unique drawers are filled with what we amass in each of our lives which make us who we are.
Here at Lace on Race, we come here gathered together for a shared purpose and ethos, one I would like to think that Mr. Oakes and his daughter Lucy would endorse were they with us in the living room that he built. And he would smile at us, at each of our drawers. He would see us, truly see us, and say something like, “I remember you! You’re the middle drawer on the left in the second bedroom! And you! You’re the bottom one, by the closet. You were tricky! But I fit you in! What fine drawers you’ve become! I made your drawers sturdy so they would hold all of your life. Show me how you decorated your drawer! Very elegant! I see Evelyn got a little handy with a bedazzler! I like it! Now go get your drawer and show me how you filled it! This is amazing! I could stay here all day just looking at what you have done with the drawers I made for each of you!
Oh, someone is crying! I see your frustration, child, when you are trying to put your drawer away for the day and it doesn’t look like it fits. That’s because you are the one and only Ling, and Ling’s drawer won’t fit into the opening, into the life, that is really Olango’s. Find your life opening, Ling. I will give you a hint: it’s the one by the window because I know you like the sunset.
When he sees us struggling with our individual drawers, heavy with the accumulated weight of life, I imagine him looking at us with kind eyes and stroking our faces with callused, yet gentle hands and saying to us: I built your drawer to be sturdy, but yours has weight that may no longer be needed. You need to be able to lift your drawer and I can see your knees buckling from the weight. Let’s look through it together; let’s see what you keep and what may need to be discarded so you can carry your drawer with lightness, and add new treasures. You can tell me the stories of all your things, and we will decide if they still serve you. Your life was not intended to be a junk drawer, sweet Christie. What is broken, what has pieces missing, what served you well years ago, but no longer does? Can you not talk about this item just yet? We will place it gently in the corner of your drawer till you can. I will be right beside you as you confront your drawer, and I will safeguard it when it goes back into your life opening. I promise. Your drawer will hold. And just in case, I always have my toolbelt. A gift! Here’s one for you too.
Beloveds, everyone has a story which must be acknowledged and honored. The flip of this is that everyone has a story which must be faced and confronted and told. Even if only to one other person. Even if only to ourselves. Our singular lives live in the words, and in the white spaces, of our stories.
There is an alchemy in the telling and hearing of each of our unique stories, whether or not these stories are told in a kind of unique narrative fashion, or if instead our individual stories sort of leech out of our pores, like a custom made fragrance. It is this fragrance, borne of ten thousand signature scents, in the house Mr. Oakes built, that infuses this space.
Celebrate your uniqueness and honor the uniqueness of The Other.
Mr. Oakes is smiling.
And the candles illuminate the Fifth Day.
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