PARK BENCH SOJOURNER

Bernard Baruch, Statesman and Adviser to US Presidents, in the early nineties, was known for his penchant in sitting at the park bench in La Fayette Park in Washington, and at Central Park in New York City.  Sitting for hours, he would feed the pigeons, and  at times talked to the people he met at the park about government affairs.

A park bench was built in his honor.

Deep thinkers like Baruch have been known to simply withdraw from their usual preoccupation, to find time for quietness and sail in the ocean of thought. Productive people know the need for rest.

Is this solitary exercise wasted time?

For the hurried modern man, this may appear to be so, but to others, finding time to be one’s own company, is a way of emotional and mental house cleaning. Doing away with the mind’s clutter, taking hold of what is dear in life, and watching the rhythm of the day as it slowly fades in time.

To rest in the confidence that the Creator of the universe, who ordained the path of the planets and caused the changing of the seasons, is the same God who will likewise see us through the day He has made, is far more heartening than believing that we are mere accidents of nature, or of chance, struggling to scale the mount of meaningless existence.