Will You Share Your Wine?

My dad is one of Britain’s great eccentrics: he hasn’t bought clothes for years because ‘they’re too expensive’ and would much rather wear second hand stuff given to him, mainly from families who’ve lost someone. His particular pride and joy is a collection of pants from the elderly man who used to work at the tomato farm.  When he told Mum of his new acquisition she said ‘Oh James, you really are the end.’

He works very hard, he grows his own fruit & veg, wastes nothing and recycles absolutely everything. He turned up yesterday with some home grown lettuce…in a rather unique carrier bag:

He’s widely known and loved and has the most kind, even and generous mood I’ve ever witnessed in anyone: absolutely nothing seems to phase him. He phoned me up once to tell me there’d been a burglar in the house the night before. His lodger had come to wake him and tell him he thought someone was in the house. Dad flung on his dressing gown and they’d both gone downstairs together into the kitchen. As they walked in, ‘the burglar’ startled and inadvertently cornered himself in a small pantry area, thinking he was heading for the back door.

Dad pulled up a chair in front of the burglar, blocking him in and sat down (in his dressing gown). He started chatting to him while the lodger called the police. Apparently it took the police a good 25 minutes to get there (rural village) and when they did, they found the burglar looking suitably contrite, a swag bag bursting with jewellery in one of the flower beds and a truncheon stuck in a shrub. Dad said the most inconvenient thing about the whole episode was that he was dying for a pee but couldn’t go because the burglar would have scarpered.

This isn’t the first time he’s encountered a burglar in the house. The time before this, he made a cup of tea for the intruder and asked him to sit at the kitchen table until the police had arrived. Which, unbelievably, he did.

There are so many stories that I could tell you – I might save them for another time but when I started writing this post, my intent was to tell you about the tramp he once met…

Dad was in town doing something or other and sat down for a rest on a park bench, next to all the market stalls. Shortly afterwards a tramp sat down next to him clutching a bottle of wine.  Dad said hello and the tramp grunted. Then the tramp asked Dad for some money. The conversation apparently went something like this…

Tramp:  ‘Spare change?’
Dad:      ‘Yes I do.  I’ll give you some money if you share your wine with me.’

The tramp throws him a dirty look and asks for money again.

Dad:      ‘Will you share your wine? I’m really happy to give you some money if you’ll share your wine with me.’

The tramp ignores Dad.

Dad:      ‘Why won’t you share your wine? Do you think it’s right to ask me for something of mine if you’re not prepared to give me something of yours?

The tramp gets up and walks off. With his wine.

Dad observes the tramp sitting down on another park bench next to a woman who’s eating an apple. He watches the tramp lean towards the woman and say something to her, so he darts across the market square and asks her if the tramp had just asked her for some money, to which she confirmed he had.

So Dad told her that the tramp had asked him for some too but he didn’t give him any because the tramp wasn’t prepared to share his wine.

So the woman (now feeling a bit awkward and not knowing which way to turn) offered the tramp the rest of her apple, which he angrily throws to the ground before getting up and walking off….

I’m hazy about what happened after that – it’s very possible that dad followed him for a few minutes, warning the tramp’s next victim(s) about his unwillingness to share.

I definitely wouldn’t have said this if someone asked me for some money, but fair play to him and it did make me think – we might feel it’s ok to ask someone for something but what if someone asks us for something in return, particularly something we struggle to give?

It could be anything: our precious and much needed time, something where we’d need to cancel our plans to help them, or put ourselves into a situation we’d be really unhappy with, so we could help someone…where do you stand on this? Would you do it for some people and not others and how would you decide where your limit was for any given situation?

There are definitely people in this world that are very happy to take and less keen on giving and I know that can make me more wary about me giving my all.  Generally speaking though, are we really as happy to give as we think we are?  On the flip side, do you accept when someone says they can’t give you something?  Do you judge them for it or make them justify their decision in any way?

It’s all to do with currency too though isn’t it?  What we think is so important to us may not be viewed as such by someone else and vice versa.  I see and hear this sort of dilemma primarily within families and close friends.  Family members and close friends ask more of each other and hence more boundaries are pushed.  Do you respect others’ boundaries?

Would you share your wine?

You might also enjoy:
Talking To Our Kids About Drugs
Handling Bullies – The Bully Jar
Carry On Self-Catering
The Sickly Child

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