Strangers aren't as strange as we imagine

As little as we like to admit it, we all need help once in a while.

I went to see Children of Men last night after some rave review by
friends with highly respected taste in film. I wonder how certain
types of texts move into my life in groups. The spiritual books and
now, another movie, similar to City of God, that exposes hope even in
a world of despair and violence. Everyone, people are open miracles,
crave hope. However, we easily fall into reactionary modes --
simply reacting to the world around us rather than trying to be or
create that hope. Miracles are small and natural events -- in the
case of this movie, having a child. Not one to be all sappy about
children and babies, the poignancy of a world without children,
without a future was still chilling. In both movies, the characters
were mostly well-rounded, not all evil and not all pure. Even the
heroes of the stories had their flaws, truly tragic heroes as
outlined in classical philosophy. The journey structure of Children
of Men was beautiful and allowed for exploration of the theme of the
kindness of strangers in the most unexpected places, for our need to
be open to trusting those who we normally would not and being
prepared that those we trust are not always perfect in that trust.

Today, I received the first issue The Sun, a Christmas gift from my
dear friend and original fellow blogger, Alizarin. Over breakfast I
flipped to find some short pieces to read and came across a
collection of tales from readers about help -- times when help game
generously and unexpectedly, often from strangers.

This reminds me of my own series of essays that I occasionally visit
and then neglect for too long about the beauty and transformation
possible in our experiences with strangers. I have my writing class
next weekend and so maybe all of this hint which piece I should
develop for our session (I write to procrastinate working on this
writing).