The human mind has an infinite capacity for smallness

And so often I find myself falling prey to that temptation.

Who will get custody of Britney's kids? How big will be the shrine Anna Nicole Smith's mother builds and how much admission will she charge? Okay, this stuff I rarely fall prey to, it just floats around there on the edges of my consciousness.

But some other stuff. Yeah. I interned once for a wonderful politician who truly was just an incredibly good human being and who did not possess any of the characteristics of a typical politician. He lost his umpteemth reelection bid a few years ago to a man who I don't much admire. This man switched parties to further his own career, and although I know him personally, I am hard pressed to say what his true beliefs are. I took the loss in that election very very hard and to this day I am disgusted by the lying, dirty tactics that were used in the race. But fast forward a few years. Last summer a tragedy occurred in our community involving this man's son and ongoing suspicion that he committed a terrible crime. My first reaction... God's honest truth... was that karma is a bitch.

And in that one second I realized that noone is immune to smallness of spirit and that while I might like to try to stay above the fray, I am just as guilty of gossip and thinking cruel thoughts and judgment as the next person. I've regretted thinking that thought every single day since. Today I saw that the story has been picked up by the AP wire and my heart broke for that boy, for the boy who was killed and for the families that are both involved in the tragedy. They don't need their story splashed about and gossiped about more than it already has been. I learned a big lesson that day, one that I reflect on often whenever I feel the urge to make a judgment, share a judgment, gossip about someone behind their back. These are real people, real emotions, very real stories with information and details we will never fully understand or know.

I read a great quote the other day from Eleanor Roosevelt. "Great minds discuss ideas. Average minds discuss events. Small minds discuss people." I'm going to try to make that my new motto.