IS THERE AN OCCUPATION FOR AN OBSERVER OF LIFE?

Dutifully I turned the pages of the calendars on the first day of September. I'm always anxious to see what the new picture will be on my favorite calendars, which are Travelers Insurance Company's to which local agencies add their own imprint but which I simply call the Currier and Ives calendar and St. Louis artist Mary Engelbreit's calendar.

For September, on the Currier and Ives there is a picture of an old grist mill with farmers busily loading up their wagons with their winter supply of flour.

The thought crossed my mind that if we had to spend a little more time providing our own food, such as plowing for and sowing wheat, operating the binder at harvest time, shocking the wheat, calling in the threshing machine and attendant workers, taking the grain to the mill to be ground, going after it again, we wouldn't have time to get so entangled in other nations' troubles. That's reactionary, isn't it? Sorry.

We'd probably not have penicillin nor have left a buggy on the moon. There must be some Great Equation being worked out, slowly but surely.

The picture on Englebreit's calendar is that of a young girl reading a letter she has just received and a quotation from Goethe that says: "To know someone here or there with whom you can feel there is an understanding in spite of distances or thoughts unexpressed...that can make this life a garden."

Mary always has a quotation or a single word for each month, which, I suppose, she wishes us to dwell on for that month.

The two pictures are not related in any way except portraying a pragmatic approach to life -- processing flour for the literal loaf of daily bread and the tenuous, abstract connection of minds that feed another aspect of life. The one is mere existence, the two together is existence with purpose, assurance, expectation and pleasure -- the whole man as Bill Moyers likes to dwell on, as well as many others, including me.

Well, anyway, turning the calendar pages, there was a new month, a new season staring at me. A mere 30 day division of time. What would I do with it?

First I had to get over my semi-shock that a season had passed and I'd hardly noticed it. What did I do besides water petunias and pinch off spent blossoms. Well, I hammered in a few loose nails and put up a new wren house. That's still now very much. I observed. That's it, I observed. The world has to have observers, doesn't it? I wonder what effect that word, observer, would have, if placed on a work application, after the blank calling for occupation? Maybe I could squeeze in "observer of mankind."

Perhaps that would get me an interview with the potential employer who would want to see such a person and, no doubt, would ask, "And what are your conclusions?"

There now, I'd be in a fix. Probably the first thing that would come to my mind would be Thoreau's conclusion. "The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation."

"How so?" my interviewer might pursue.

"Well, there is food to buy, taxes to pay, health care expenses, taxes, clothes, rent and taxes." I'd repeat that "taxes" often, trying to get him or her off on another track while I scrambled to think of something besides Thoreau's conclusions.

I'd soon think of Rutlege and paraphrase him. "The human mind is somewhat proud and perverse and inclined to reject any proof of God's love, but the human heart doesn't do so and the human heart is a better guide." And then, as final proof I'd say, "And God made man and said it was good, and I have no reason to doubt it."

But, my interviewer, having read some himself, might say, "Leaving Thoreau, Rutledge and God aside, what are your conclusions?"

Trapped! But after a minute or so I'd say, "I have found that most people are kind and civil. They may argue with you with indignation or agree with you with qualifications, will put you down if they feel you need putting down, parry and thrust, put their own common welfare above yours, but when you are really in trouble, mentally, spiritually or physically and hold their eyes with yours so they can `read the understanding and thoughts unexpressed,' they will not go away but reach down with whatever helping hand they can give."

Employer: "That's all very interesting but we're looking for someone to physically operate the super-collider town in Texas, interpret the results and assess what effect it will have on generations to come. The whole world is observing."

Our eyes would not meet pleadingly and I would have observed that.

REJOICE!