Going Back to People.

I finished my previous job last Friday and today is the beginning of a month’s break, before starting the new job in August. The first 10 days of our break will be spent about 5 or 6 hours away (depends how slow I drive) interstate at a place called Wagga Wagga, where I first served as an Associate Pastor some 19 years ago. Although there are only 3 or 4 still there of the people we knew at the church then, there are still a couple of dozen we know still in the district.

Although we spent over 12 months there and got to know the place well, it is not the place that we are re-visiting but the people. I have noticed over the years, and after many moves that although there are a few places that stand out in one’s memory, it is more often the people and not the place that attracts. (There are exceptions and soon I will have a blog on one of those areas.)

When we were there in 88, Wagga Wagga was touted as the largest in-land City in New South Wales; and. as such was the regional centre of a large rural farming area. It is a large well-presented City, with a large well-provided shopping Mecca for those more than 100 kms away. It has its own botanical Garden, with its own major Camellia Garden section and a miniature train and even a mini Zoo. So all in all, apart from the weather (very hot in Summer & very cold in Winter) it is not at all a bad place to live. If you have to live in NSW that is!!!

However for us here, the connection is the people and not the place. Since we left in early 89, we have been back there a few times (probably half a dozen over the time) and it is always the people and not the place that calls us back. That is not to say that we don’t enjoy revisiting some of the old places again and either marvelling or cringing at the changes. Just that it is the people that attract us again and again.

What about you? Are you largely a places person or a people’s person? Would you be happy alone on a deserted Island? Or do you still need people but wonder why they avoid you? If so it might pay to just stop for a while and examine how you treat other people. Instead of complaining why so and so hasn’t visited you, ask yourself how many times you have visited them in the same time line under discussion. If the count is in your favour, then you have a good augment, but if the number is even just neutral, then you my friend, are as much at fault as the other person. So, if this blog encourages you to think of somebody you haven’t seen or heard from for some time, make the effort to renew the contact, even if initially it is only a letter or phone call. This time it really is, all up to you to make the first move. Will you?