When you spent a week with more than one person who has made a decision to live in intentional community, you come home and realize you don’t know as many of your neighbors as you thought you did. At least, that is what happened to me.

I was walking around the pond in our neighborhood when the man who sits on the corner spoke to me, “cute pup you got there.” I can’t resist a compliment to our dog Lucky; she is pretty cute. For the first time ever I stopped to talk to him.

Mr. Knight has been sitting on that corner for longer than I owned my house. He told me about when the pond went in and how he likes it where it Is quiet. He told me about his wife since passed, and his children. He told me about the old dog he has at home.

Mr. Knight asked me where I usually walk and when I described my normal routes he nodded his head in approval. He has our neighborhood completely mapped out in his head and seems to him I walk a mile on what I call the short walk, three on the longer one. He didn’t need Google maps to tell him that.

“You must be in pretty good shape being able to walk all that way.”

That one comment was all it took to see my body with a gentler lens. My stomach may not look the way I want it to in a swimsuit, but I can walk forever. My body is a gift.

About that time my dog came to nudge Mr. Knight’s hand and lick his water bottle. “She must be thirsty, can I give her some water?” I thought she only wanted a pat, but he insisted on trying. When my crazy dog rejected the water from my hand, she let her drink his water straight out of the mouth of the bottle, and when he turned the bottle up ways she grabbed the top by the mouth and he let her drink the whole thing.

I felt seen. I think he did too.

I think after food, water and shelter, we have a need to be seen. I think sometimes we would sacrifice the shelter part for the seen part if we were really honest with ourselves.

Here is the lie scarcity tells us about being seen: There are only so many sight lines, there are only so many opportunities and you better quick snag one of them, even if it is at the detriment of your neighbor. That isn’t the way being seen works. The more people you see the more sight lines you create. There is an abundance of spaces at this table, an infinite amount of leaves to add to the middle.

For me, scarcity tells me that being seen only counts in blog stats, or “important people” but the spirit is whispering to me that Mr. Knight may just be the most important person I know. He sees me. My kids and my husband see me. I am living in the land of abundant sight, a chance for me to drink right out of the bottle of abundance, and pull it down for more if I want.

This week’s love bomb theme is BEING SEEN.

The Short: Leave a comment here, I will email you the persons contact, say something nice.

The Long: So WHAT is a LOVE BOMB and how will I COORDINATE it? A love bomb is when we all come together to lavish a deserving someone with Tweets, Facebook likes, Blog comments, emails, and general social media shout outs. Imagine waking up to the amount of Birthday notifications only they are nice things about you for seemingly no reason. It would make you feel pretty good, huh? Yeah!

And if you want to email me people to be bombed I would love that! I have six more slots to fill.