Today at the grocery

I am in the middle of a mindfulness workshop. At week four of an eight-week class intended to help me be more present in the "now." Doing so, I'm told, reduces stress, and as a result, improves health, as well as allows one to see things more clearly, without emotion or attachment to a specific outcome. Part of the practice is to observe how you react - not seek to change or judge - just observe. So I did.

Today I went to the grocery. It has been so cold and snowy that this was the first day I considered it. It was clear and cold with slushy, sandy, salty uck everywhere. Outside and in. Inevitable.

While shopping I came around the end of an aisle to see a young - perhaps six or seven-year-old - boy running toward me. He was bundled up in a snowsuit against the cold. Perhaps to distract him from being indoors in outdoors clothes or for another reason entirely he was eating a slice of processed cheese food. It was bunched up in one hand as he ran. But it was obvious that it was that product that comes wrapped in plastic, slice by slice. He was running to (I assume) catch up with whomever he was there with. Maybe he dawdled in front of the Fruit Loops too long, but he was on a tear. When dodging a shopper, he dropped he cheese on the floor.

(I could stop here, but I won't.)

He stopped in his tracks and without missing a beat, picked up the cheese, took a bite and started running again. He disappeared around the corner.


That was my observation. My reaction - even though I wasn't supposed to have one - had several levels...

(Level 1) YUCK!

(Level 2) Why would a child eat off a floor covered with slushy, sandy, salty uck? Where was the adult supervision?

(Level 3) It's bad enough that the child is eating processed food, but from the floor!?

There was a time that I or another adult who saw what was about to happen would have stepped in to stop it. And the parent or other adult with that child would have thanked the person intervening.  Isn't that as bad for society as it is for the child? Not even considering the pros/cons of processed food.

So, the connection back to mindfulness? I'm struggling with that. It appears that the child wasn't mindful of his action, but he's a child. At what point is it reasonable to expect that?

The adult that I assume was somewhere nearby was perhaps being as mindful as they could be - providing cheese rather than sugar - trying to deal with many things simultaneously.  Maybe they would have quickly snatched that cheese away before the bite could be taken if they had only seen it.

But the intervention of the past...what about that? What happened to "it takes a village to raise a child" and the assumption of good intent when others took a person's child in hand? The assumption of shared values about basic things like looking out for a child's welfare? Were past interventions really mindful or reactive? Does it matter if the intent is to stop a a child from eating something from a really dirty floor? Why do "good Samaritans" need laws to protect them?

I have so many questions...maybe there are satisfying answers out there. I hope so.