Finding Our Commonality

“What the hell are you doing trespassing on my property?” he asked gruffly, angrily, threateningly, as I stood, knee-deep in the creek that runs past our house. I was throwing a rock for our 14 year old dog, laughing at her antics with my 10 year old son; he was standing next to a growling pickup inches from the bank.

I’ve never liked confrontation much, so I spoke softly, apologized for trespassing (which, technically and admittedly, I was), and moved with my son and dog the ten feet back to my property. He whipped his truck around, speeding off through the meadow in a burst of exhaust.

I wondered immediately how the situation could have been different: Rather than conflict, could we have found connection, even conversation? After all, we live in the same small town, essentially on the same street. (He doesn’t actually own the property next door, but takes care of it.) We’ve traveled to the same places around the world, and judging from his smiles in posted pictures, he loved them as much as I. I’m the one who picks up boxes and other trash from “his” meadow and creek that blows in from open trashcans up the road. Had we spoken, some of this might have been discovered, tensions eased, and division dampened to some degree.

Unfortunately, all we got was conflict.