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“It’s not what you look at that matters; it’s what you see.” (Henry David Thoreau) Reading this quote a long time ago, I thought to myself, this means “seeing with the eyes, believing with the heart” because when we look at something or anyone, what is in our heart interprets what we see with our eyes. I suppose one might say the mind is the intermediary between the heart and eyes and can only interpret based on what it has been taught and experienced. When we allow it, the heart, open to possibilities, can see anything through the eyes of love.

I was on an errand to a Walgreens in a nearby city recently. I waited patiently behind the diminutive, elderly-looking woman with curly-dyed hair while she purchased her pack of Marlboro cigarettes. I felt my patience tested when the cashier asked her for an ID, as it seemed apparent she was old enough, but the policy is that if you ask one person, you must ask everyone. Still, it was frustrating to observe because the woman struggled to dig out her ID.

I felt sorry for her that she had to go through that, but as she did, she leaned toward the cashier and conspiratorially shared that two men were outside the door soliciting. In fact, they were not. I had come in behind her, noting that the two men at the trash can were rummaging through it, looking for treasure, and didn’t seem to notice anything or anyone around them.

I presume the two men were making the best of their lives. I saw their aged bikes propped against the trash can, absorbed in their present adventure. They were bent over the trash can, blocking access to deposit my candy wrapper. I took it inside and asked the cashier if I could put it in his waste can. In a disgusted-sounding voice, he commented about how there are always loiterers outside the door by the trashcan.

I hadn’t mentioned anyone was near the outside trash. So when, a few minutes later, the Marlboro woman purchasing cigarettes reported soliciting at the entrance, I wasn’t surprised he called the manager. As she approached where I was, I turned and quietly told her I had just come in and observed no soliciting. Just two men were rummaging through the trash. She had been searching for a particular camera but decided to investigate outside the door without it. The men were gone.

The cigarette woman seemed afraid of what she saw as she walked into the store – two men she didn’t know who looked different from her, and her mind interpreted that she was in danger. It didn’t matter that two men were at the trash can minding their own business; what mattered was a perceived threat.

I saw two men picking purposefully through the garbage, not even noticing I existed.

Love liberates our eyes to see what is hidden in the presence of love and allows us to reimagine with our hearts what is possible.