On a Bench at Epworth

Today I’m sitting on a bench at Epworth. What am I doing? Nothing.

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It’s not easy doing nothing. It doesn’t come natural. You have to work at it. First of all, you have to decide to do nothing. Try it, and you’ll find a civil war raging in your mind between ‘doing’ and ‘being.’

The brain must make a choice. It’s a hard threshold to cross. It’s easier for the body to say, “Let’s eat,” than the brain to say, “Do nothing.” Flesh often trumps (oops) cognitive thought, if you know what I mean.

The rub comes when you decide to ‘be’ while details of life scream ‘do.’ It’s the eternal conundrum, “…to be or not to be, that is the question.” Doing something subjects you to making the wrong decision. Consequences ensue.

Remember first grade? It’s when you learned to keep your head down, your mouth shut and to sit on your hands in the back row. Invisibility is your friend. So today I ‘be’ doing nothing on this bench at Epworth.

I do admit it took some doing to overcome the guilt of being non-productive. Benches are good for this purpose. Nobody expects you to be doing much as you sit there looking confused and lost in the haze of nothingness. Especially if you have white hair and a host of wrinkles.

Being a do-nothing slacker used to go against our grain. The old Puritan work ethic, you know. No more, gone with the wind. It reminds me of the ham sandwich I ordered at Hot Dawg Emporium the other day…a lot of filler and essence of ham. Culture is changing.

Have you encountered any Puritans lately? They faded out in Salem, Massachusetts after the spate of hangings which followed the witch sightings. This state has since become the Mecca for the do-nothing progressive minions. Clown sightings are the next new thing there.

For slackers, doing nothing is an art form. It finds its apotheosis in many places, not the least of which is in decisions made in the secret of voting booths. It’s disguised as amusement, or entertainment, a sub-category of entitlement.

Even if you’re successful in sitting on a bench doing nothing, your brain is doing something. It thinks, which is a rarity in modern culture. Today I observe the volume of traffic crossing yonder bridge. You can see it, but not hear it. I conclude that traffic is not necessarily a bad thing. It distracts people from thinking. Thinking by the masses is far more dangerous.

Being bored with traffic, I sit motionless and think about Epworth. It’s a Methodist Church retreat, a religious version of ‘penal reform’ school for children. Its purpose is to indoctrinate them to the ravages of sin while they co-exist among roaches that ransack their backpacks by night.

Epworth was named for the boyhood home of the Wesley brothers, John and Charles. A couple hundred years ago Gen. Jimmy Oglethorpe, aka Big Jim, set up the fledging Georgia Colony at Savannah. The Wesley boys followed him to proselytize and convert the Indians to Christianity. A worthy calling, but doomed to failure.

They succeeded in casting out a few evil spirits from the Indians, notably the Revenge Demon. It had enslaved the tribes with inordinate passions, like Drunkenness. Not having a herd of pigs, this demon was exorcized and cast into the next best thing—sand gnats, aka no-see-ums, which have since propagated exponentially along the coast and constantly remind inhabitants of the wages of this sin.

After an hour here I’m near to achieving Nirvana, known as a ‘bench high.’ It’s akin to the ecstasy experienced by runners after they have passed ‘the wall.’ Then a fellow in a green suit walks by.

“How ya doing?” he asks.

“I’m not, I’m being. What’s with you and the green suit?” I reply.

“I’m being invisible, blending in with the hibiscus. It’s a lesson I learned in first grade,” he says as he slowly vanishes into the shrubs.

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So much for benches and doing nothing. I’m exhausted. Like I said, it’s hard work.

I pack up and head to the beach for a nap. Judging by the scenery, it proves to be the best decision of the day.


Bud Hearn
September 30, 2016