Garfield to Larned; Distance = 10 Miles; People Met = 5
The day to Larned started out poorly but ended up well. They say bad news happens in threes. The first bit of bad news was the rainy weather. The second bit of bad news was a Sheriff stopped us because someone called and he had to check my ID while we stood waiting in the rain. You could tell he felt a little sheepish about the whole thing; apparently we did not look dangerous. Shortly after we started walking again a big hauler drove by on the opposite side of the road and blasted his horn for a long time. Trucks (and trains) often blow their horns in a friendly gesture; but this definitely appeared to be hostile.
Speaking of hostile, I recorded a bit of the Kansas Winds we were fighting a couple days ago, which surpassed 40 mph. I’m finally getting around to providing that here.
I was thinking I had pretty poor material to work with this day for my blog and hoped something of noteworthy kindness would turn up in Larned. We stayed at a United Methodist Church once again, where Janice informed me of both Prairieland Foods and the Helping Hands Ministry. I’ll get to Prairieland Foods tomorrow.
I interviewed Jason Toll, the outreach pastor in charge of the Helping Hands Ministry, but only after we chatted “off-line” for a very long time. He had been of the opinion that good works was mainly pursued by those compelled by their faith until a string of recent events led him to question that. The churches of Larned had sponsored a community Thanksgiving dinner for years but cited waning participation of volunteers as a reason to drop it this year. In reaction to the papers announcing the churches dropping the tradition a woman from the Larned community came to speak to Jason just before me with an interest in keeping it going.
That led Jason to first “interview” me to find out why I did what I was doing. I professed that even though I was a Christian that had little to do with my advocacy for community involvement to address Housing, Health and Hunger. That led to a long and very friendly discussion between two people with very similar goals but allegedly dissimilar motivations. I say allegedly because I don’t quite believe Jason when he claims to be pursuing the second great commandment, love your neighbor, in obedience to the first, love God. No, from everything I could sense Jason has an empathic heart and he is compelled to help others independently of any other motivation than he simply cares.
In any case once we got to the topic at hand Jason provided a concise overview of the Helping Hands Ministry. In the process he gave me great material for a kindness blog.
As we approach virtually every town in Kansas a grain elevator looms on the horizon. The shape of these massive structures, particularly from a great distance, reminds me of Oz. So here we are in Kansas continually hiking towards Oz.
We're not in Kansas anymore, Dorothy ... oh wait ... yes we are
