Good People

Christine and Grace, Naturally

I HAVE TO TALK TO CHRISTINE about Grace, but I won’t talk to Grace about Christine. I have talked to Christine about Grace before and it has always been a good experience, I’ve always learned something. Talking to Christine about Grace is easy. I would even say it comes naturally, though I don’t think talking comes naturally to either one of us. I’m talking now about me and Christine, not me and Grace or Grace and Christine. Grace is a natural talker, but you can’t talk to her about Christine. If you know anything about Grace, then this is what you should know about her. Christine is a different story unless it comes from Grace, which it shouldn’t. You shouldn’t talk to Grace about Christine and the reasons are obvious. I won’t even spell out the reasons they are that obvious. But Christine isn’t a natural talker and sometimes she’s barely one at all. I have been around Christine for hours at a time without hearing word one from her. Sometimes you have to ask Christine a specific question to get her talking, but then you can’t shut her up is the problem. I remember once I asked Christine for the time and she performed a monologue about the plight of honeybees instead. She went on and on about the honeybees, how they were dying off in record numbers and how the bees were flying away and not coming back, that keepers would find boxes empty of adult bees except for a live queen. She said this was unacceptable because bees play a crucial role as pollinators and we rely on honeybees to keep commercial agriculture productive. She said about a third of our foods comes from these honeybees, including apples and nuts and summer fruits like blueberries and strawberries, and even alfalfa, and guar bean. I tried to ask her about alfalfa and guar bean and if berries were considered fruits, but once Christine is in the middle like this, you can’t ask her anything. She went on to say that bees contribute billions of dollars to our crop production and that the losses are unprecedented and fast. This is what Christine told me when I asked for the time and I believed her. That’s one of the reasons you want to talk to Christine because she knows what she’s talking about. I’m not sure Grace knows anything about honeybees, which proves something, I’m sure. Now please don’t get me wrong on this, Grace is a lovely woman and she is not inconsiderable, but I’m not sure talking to her about anything is a good experience, particularly when it comes to Christine. But that’s not the real reason you shouldn’t talk to Grace about Christine and everyone know this. I don’t have to spell it out and this is a good thing. I’m not sure I like talking to either of them, as I’m not much of a talker myself. But later today I do have to talk to Christine about Grace. There’s no avoiding it. All of us are worried about Grace and we have to do something while there’s still time, because Grace is worth the effort. Just yesterday I was reminded of this. I saw Grace at the supermarket buying groceries and she was giving a dollar to one of the local kids for their annual bake sale fund-raiser. You won’t ever see me or Christine giving a dollar to the local kids for their fund-raiser and that’s the difference between Grace and the rest of us. This trumps everything, as far as I’m concerned, including the plight of honeybees and whom you can talk about and with whom. Grace is better than all of us put together, which is why we love Grace and want to do everything we can to save her.