LIFE'S KISSES & COLORS

THE GIFT OF THE KISS

Kissing is a universal expression of affection, friendship, and of course love. It is executed in different ways in different cultures. The elegant head-bowing kiss of the hand....the dainty touch-of-the-lips on both cheeks...the bear-hug kiss...the passionate mouth-devouring-kiss. At its core, the kiss is an act of union between you and the object of your attentions.

What's especially interesting about kisses is the way we choose to dispense them. To friends they are a salute...to family, a reassurance...to lovers, a prelude.

Union is the operative word here. As frightened and self-conscious as we mere mortals all are in this staggering world of dangers and complexities, there is always this little hunger inside that can best be sated only by contact with other equally frightened and self-conscious mortals.

Yes, there was the Judas Kiss; and we all fear the lie behind some kisses. On the other hand, there is the Mother Kiss; and from birth forward we find ourselves seeking its enormous comfort again and again.

THIS SIDE OF THE RAINBOW

Colors...! These are the visual splotches and splashes that fill the canvass of our life from the palette of our god. Life in a black-and-white world would hardly be life at all.

Green -- it registers spring and summer and bounty on our retinas. Orange -- it is the voice of the sun in our lives. Blue -- the feel of sea and sky that brightens our faces. Brown -- the strong earthen smell of soil under our feet. Red -- the surge of festivity shooting through us.

There is an entire rainbow of colors this side of the rainbow, in which we move and live and feel and thrill. To lose one's sight is to lose this ecstasy. Perhaps this is why a young Galilean long ago walked the shores of the Jordan. He said he had come to make the lame walk, and especially the blind see.

While we have it, our sight is surely among our noblest gifts.