You’re Really Not Going to Need Those …
A small, fat white envelope of sturdy construction sat on the mat. Even before I saw the words ‘identity and passport service’ I knew what it was; and because being between passports always brings on a kind of low-level claustrophobia, I feel a sense of relief – freedom of movement has been returned to me!
Hastily I unwrap the little parcel to make sure it really is a new passport, and I’m filled with relief and gratification as I examine the stiff, shiny document. Briefly, I flick through the accompanying leaflets as I cross the room to bin them and, suddenly, stop – my hand hovering above the oblivion of the trash.
One of the leaflets is about organ donation, which makes me think of all those little films I’ve sat through at the beginning of many satsangs while thinking, “Yes, definitely should do that,” but then just not got round to it because I can always do it later; I can do it any time.
It occurs to me that Baba Ji has suggested such a little, easy thing (yes, even easier than meditation is, in theory!) and yet I’ve just ignored that hint. No wonder meditation is so hard if I can’t get round to doing even such a little thing as this. So: okay! I’ll do it now!
Opening the leaflet, I see it’s even easier than I had thought: all I have to do is text ‘save’ to a six-digit number on my phone. That’s it! Okay, so they text me back a couple of times for my name, address, date of birth, and to ask whether I want to donate the whole caboodle or get picky about my inner noodles, but it’s all over in a few minutes. And for anyone who’s run out of free texts, there’s a Web address where you can do the same thing just as easily online. Of course, the exact process is likely to vary from country to country, but I expect that in most places it will be just as simple.
Forty minutes later, driving back from dropping the children off at school, I’m just about to pull out at a junction when I see a car closing in rapidly from the right and I take my foot back off the pedal. There was never really a chance of me not seeing the car, but it made me think: Wow! Imagine! How serendipitous would that have been? To have only just this morning signed up to the organ-donor register and then to make a sharp exit, young enough for my bits and pieces to be worth having. I could have saved somebody’s life this very morning! I didn’t, as it turned out, and that’s just as well because several people here (not least my children) still rather need me in my currently assembled form.
It wasn’t that I was likely not to see that car – it was just a point of reflection, mostly. The idea that something like that could happen and my essential organs go to waste – that I might not have got around to signing up for organ donation in time, that I might have missed the chance to save the lives of several other people.
Perhaps I’m the only one who’s been slack in effort and devotion not to have got round to doing this organ-donation thing till now. After all, Baba Ji has been pointing out to us for years what a good idea it is. And of course you, or I, may live to 120 and end up so worn out that our presence on the register turns out to be a complete waste of bureaucratic time and effort (although I understand that even the organs of those in their seventies and eighties can be used to save lives). But still, I thought I’d mention it.