Patience

“Knowing trees, I understand the meaning of patience. Knowing grass, I can appreciate persistence.” —Hal Borland

I learned how to "wait" a long time ago. I waited on my high school sweetheart to get ready for a date sometimes for hours, but not patiently. I waited to leave home, I waited to grow up and get rich-- (still waiting). Patience remains a way of being that eluded me right up to my heart attack and even during. You should have seen me as a "patient" who had to "wait" in the emergency room and then later in the "waiting" room to see my doctor for a follow up.

What I needed in my teens, twenties,thirties, forties and now fifties is patience-- with my own healing process, patience with my wife's. After all she survived a heart attack, surgery and my impatience.

I need to cultivate and exercise patience with people in general: the slow driver ahead of me, the person with too many items in the “express” checkout, the guy I saw yesterday flossing his teeth and talking on the cell phone while driving. To live in this foreign land of patience, I need a greater sense of humor. And most of all, I need to have patience with myself while I'm trying to learn patience.

Patience is more than a virtue. It’s a necessity, if I'm ever going to experience serenity that lasts longer than a few minutes.

Question: With whom or what do you need more patience with?