If you read

my column last week you know I was harping on and on

about the need for more simplicity and quiet places and

peace - all that glorious stuff that has become so

scarce during this amazing 20th century.

Well, I'm

still there this week. And I'm not alone. In fact, I've

been commiserating with friends about the fact that we

have far too many choices.

I know. You

want to remind me of how many times I've talked about how

precious our choices are, and how healthy it is to

remember that we always have choices.

I still

feel that way. But there are extremes.

For

instance, yesterday I spent ten minutes standing in front

of four shelves of tomatoes at Kroger. The canned tomato

space was probably more than six feet wide. Three times I

scanned the shelves for tomato sauce. I saw crushed,

diced, whole, Mexican, Italian, and many brands of all of

the above, but no sauce. Finally, I turned to a gentleman

standing beside me, who also had been scanning the

shelves forever, and said, "I don't know what you

are looking for, but if you happen to see the tomato

sauce, please point it out to me."

"That's

what I'm looking for, too. It's not here," he said.

"I've scanned the shelves three times."

Three was

the magic number before giving up, I suppose. We went on

our way without any plain old tomato sauce.

A few

minutes later, a little boy came running towards me,

"Hey, lady, we found it. We found the tomato

sauce!"

It was in

the spaghetti sauce area among more brands of prepared

spaghetti sauce than I dared to count.

A few weeks

ago I was looking for coffee filters at Ingles. I looked

and looked and counted 18 different strange

brands/designs before my eye roved over to the right

beyond the countless bags/brands of coffee where I

finally spotted plain old Mr. Coffee filters. Actually, I

think I bought the Ingles brand which was beside Mr.

Coffee. I only recall with certainty that I was quite

frustrated before I finally found what I was looking for.

How much

time do we waste each day "enjoying" all our

choices?

I recall,

as a child hearing my dad, who was then the same age I am

now, speak of the good old days when things were simpler,

slower, easier...

I wondered

at his musings and thought he just needed to learn to

appreciate more things. Now it is I who longs to

appreciate less.

I, however,

am not alone. The youth of today may be wiser than I was.

They too voice frustration over the busyness, the waste,

the perplexities of today's world. I do think simplicity

may be on its way back "in."

Perhaps,

with a strange twist, the complexity of the computer age

and the Internet may help us learn how to claim the

simplicity and order we are all beginning to crave?

Don't you

just love it when your computer crashes? Freezes up.

Turns one font into another. Letters to numbers...

A computer

will do all sorts of irritating things when we overload

it. When we try to open too much stuff at one time. When

we insist that it think about too many things at once.

Get the

picture? ...And we wonder what causes Alzheimers and

other memory impairment problems.

Ah, yes, my

mind and heart longs for quieter, simpler times. Will my

yearnings lead me in the right direction/s? Indeed,

choices, choices and more choices.

I recall

with trepidation the words of the prophet Isaiah:

"For thus the Lord God, the Holy One of Israel, has

said, `In repentance and rest you shall be saved, in

quietness and trust is your strength.' But you were

unwilling."

Are you

swallowing as hard as I am? Do you want to file your

thoughts away for a later time when you are less

flustered? Would you prefer to consider ways to simplify

your life after you have worked though at least a few of

the problems/duites that call today? Are you too busy to

think about subjects like repentance and rest?

Then you

and I are too busy.