ME AND MY MALODOROUS MASK

First, I must warn you that there is a gross factor in today’s thought. You may not want to read it: I had kept a face mask in the consul of my vehicle for when I visit establishments that demand one. I had worn it several times. Once I forgot to return it to my consul after visiting a facility, but, rather, stuck it in the back pocket of my jeans. Afterward, I exercised and worked soaking my clothes with sweat in the humid air of a hot day. I needed some materials from a home improvement store. I had forgotten that the store demanded a face mask; otherwise, I might have gone elsewhere. Parking, I exited my vehicle and began walking to the entrance of the store. It hit me, “They insist on a face mask here.” Remembering I had one in my back pocket, I was relieved I didn’t have to return to my vehicle. Covering my face by attaching the mask’s loops on one ear and then the other, I was then aware of this awful smell. I subconsciously thought, “Why does the air stink so badly? Did they spread fertilizer on a field nearby? Is there some factory whose putrid smoke is being blown in this direction by the wind?” I walked on across the lot and entered the store. I smelled it again. Though people were the magical six feet away, I still wondered. “Is that smell coming from one of them? Has one of them being laboring hard and needs a shower? Phew! That’s bad. Can’t they tell they have BO?” I strolled to the aisle where I hoped to find what I needed. As I browse, I smelled that same malodor. “No, it couldn’t be one of those folks back there. It has to be in the store. Maybe some product on the next aisle got spilled.” As I shopped my way to another, more distant part of the store, I realized I still smelled that offensive odor. “Wait, it couldn’t have been on one of those aisles”. Noticing the huge doors of the garden center opened to the main store, I concluded, “That’s it! It is something in the garden center. Maybe some bags of fertilizer, bone meal, something, broke open and the draft is wafting that smell inside throughout the main store.” But, as I walked away from that section yet still smelt the same odor, it hit me. It was my mask. The smell was coming from my mask! Worn several times, dampened by sweat, the mask must have had bacteria build-up on it. What I smelled was coming from bacteria. Yes, that’s gross. To me, a germophobe, it’s really gross. Later, I thought of my experience. I confess that the bacteria build-up did make me wonder about the safety of masks. I can’t be the only one who has worn a mask too many times. However, I’m not writing to argue the safety of wearing or not wearing a mask. I am writing because of the irony of what happened. I was blaming the smell on everyone and everything else and the whole time the source was attached (via ear loops) to me. The mask I wore tainted my perception, conclusions, opinion, etc., of everywhere I went in the store and of the folks I encountered. The outside air stank. People stank. The aisles stank. The whole store stank. Or, so I thought. The whole time it was something about me that stank. Life. Work. Church. Home. Wherever we go. Whomever we meet. We find ourselves criticizing. Finding fault. Being aggravated by. Frustrated at. Lashing out. Haranguing. Caustically commenting. Jibing. We “smell” something bad wherever we go, whomever we meet. Always something wrong with it, with them. At some point, we must have the epiphany I had in the store. The reason I find so much wrong with so many people, so much of life, lies with me. I have the wrong attitude. Wrong spirit. I have bitterness. I have a grudge. Something in my craw. A resentment. That thing is tainting all else in my life. I know that there are bad odors in the environment. I know that there are bad odors in buildings. I know that, frankly, some people stink. But, for me, the bad odor was all in my malodorous mask. I know there are some bad odors in society. I know that there are some bad odors in institutions. I know that there are individuals that just stink. I know racism exists. But, can it be that very often when one claims he “smells” reprehensible racism in the air that the smell of it is coming from his own mask? As soon as I’d made my purchase and exited the store, I reached up and jerked that mask off, and began to take gulps of fresh, unfiltered air. It never smelled so good--the same air I thought had smelled bad when I first stepped out of my vehicle. The problem of everything smelling bad because we have a bad attitude is a private matter between us and God. And what we need is a private moment with Him. One where God graciously shows us that the problem is us. He shows us where, what, and why. He moves upon us. That thing that had tainted our perspective, He removes. He creates in us a new heart, a new attitude, a new outlook. We gulp lung-fulls of fresh air, thankful we no longer breath through that impeding, malodorous mask, and then we sing, “It’s me, it’s me, it’s me, Oh, Lord, standing in the need of prayer…Not my brother, not my sister, but, it’s me, Oh, Lord…”

ME AND MY MALODOROUS MASK

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