My dear friend, Lola, came to visit us this past week. Everyone flocks to see her when she visits from Virginia.  Not only is she beautiful, discipled and fun, but she has a childlike curiosity about life.  And that brings me to a book I just got done reading entitled SENT by Heather and Ashley Holleman. They write about “Curiosity” as being the magic bullet to begin conversations with strangers and to connect with friends. She often begins a conversation with a question and then listens intently to your answer therefore remembering your answer years later. “When we allow ourselves to feel curious about other people’s lives, we believe that we will discover something meaningful and valuable from the interaction.” As we value the person before us, we need to remember he or she is made in the image of God regardless of social or economic standing. 

A bike ride with Lola means being prepared to hop off to pet a dog, to observe a plant or just to capture the moment with a picture. An Asian man down the hill from me has spent endless hours on his garden by the road.  I have been curious about his plants, since I’ve never seen some of them before. So through the Spring and into summer my curiosity simmered but never to the point where I would stop and ring his door bell. That happened when Lola was with me. She had such a level of curiosity that she echoed the words, “Old and Bold”, and rang the doorbell. The man came out and she asked her question about his flowers and I asked about the plants. The man hesitated and said, ”I don’t speak English.” Now that opened the door of curiosity for me and I said, “I can teach you,”. I taught ESL years ago. When I spoke slowly to him, I discovered he was able to answer many of our questions in English and now that Lola was “Old and Bold”, I will help him learn English and then we will discover how he grows the most amazing plants. What have your friends taught you?