Not my duck, not my bottle

There's something I'm quite sure I must have written about here before, but I can't find it so I apologise if I'm repeating myself tediously. It's just that this evening I saw a bit deeper into it.

We went for a walk, Tony and me, after supper. We only go round the block, and it takes about fifteen or twenty minutes, but that's far enough for us these days. Some of the houses we pass have a habit of putting out, "Free to take", any toys or items of furniture they no longer want. That's all well and good, but I get stressed about it when they put out a really good piece of furniture, nicely made, and I know there'll be a dewfall during the night, or it might come on to rain later, and then the finish on the wood will be spoiled. Why don't they move it on with more care? They could put it on Freegle or the Hastings Give-and-Takery on Facebook. 

This was how, back in the summer, Tony and I temporarily came to have the old coffee table that looked Chinese. Some people in that very same place just put it out "Free to take", so Tony (yes, with his bad back and his foot drop) took the car along the road so he could lug the table up the grassy bank, load it into the car and bring it home; and I polished it up and we put it on the Hastings Give-and-Takery and found it a new home.

Well, this evening they'd put out a chest of drawers. Beautiful, good quality, a lovely piece of furniture. It bothered me (and Tony) to think of it left out all night, now we have the heavy dews of autumn. We talked at some length about going back to collect it, but it was quite large and looked heavy, and our car is very small, and the place is down in a dip with a steep grassy verge to drag it up to the roadside.

Plus we've just gone through all our belongings to eliminate any surplus possessions and been really happy with how calm the house looks now it has just enough and not too much of everything. We have nowhere to put an unwanted chest of drawers, we'd only have to move it on, and our house entrance is up a flight of steps — long story short, we gave up on the idea and left it where it is.

But it made me think again of two stories that always come back to me forcefully when I think about taking responsibility (in this case, for disposal of a chest of drawers). These two stories belong together.

The first is a Zen type of story about a disciple coming for an audience with his Master. The master gives the disciple a bottle with a duck in it, and sends him away with it, instructing him to get the duck out. The young man tries every which way, and just can't do it. So he goes back to the master and confesses his failure and asks him what to do. The master just shrugs and says, "Not my duck, not my bottle."

I loved this story from first hearing it — I received it as being akin to the expression "Not my circus, not my monkeys", about knowing the boundaries of one's responsibility.

But this evening, thinking about the chest of drawers, it dawned on me that (unlike the circus/monkeys saying), the duck/bottle story is about restraint in accepting responsibility. This is important. The lesson for the disciple is about not taking on something unrealistic, too much for you, beyond your remit. 

That chest of drawers was not our duck and not our bottle. It was a pity, but it had to stay where it was. Our neighbours are forever fly-tipping their old junk. If we bring it all home it'll become a second career, and only encourage the practice.

But I said there was a second story that goes with the one about the disciple with his duck in the bottle. 

Again, it's about responsibility, and recognising what is yours to do and where that ends.

A friend recounted it to me.

They worked at a place staffed by volunteers, a sort of spiritual centre. On one occasion, they were walking along the main driveway to the accommodation buildings when they fell in with a young man who had been there as a volunteer. Not a very inspiring individual, neither interesting nor industrious, he had nonetheless been taken on, housed and warmed and fed and given work to do — and now he was tired of it and decided to leave. 

My friend stopped to talk — or, more accurately, listen — and heard his tale of woe and how he was leaving. He had no transport, the place was miles from anywhere, and (crucially) he had no money. 

My friend, ever kind and protective, immediately felt concerned for him, and was on the verge of offering to help him out — give him some money and a lift to the station — when the director of the place drove in through the gates in his Landrover, spotted them there and pulled up to chat. He, too, listened carefully as the now ex-volunteer regaled him with his troubles. 

Thoughtfully, not unkindly, the director said: "Oh, dear. What're you going to do, Jack?"

And that's the thing, isn't it? There are the things that are yours to do, and the things that are not. The director had given the volunteer bed and board and a chance to belong: but he didn't want it. He rejected it.

That was fine. No one blamed him. No one was annoyed with him. But when he wanted to pass on that duck and bottle for someone else to fix, in effect the director simply said, "No thanks. Not my duck. Not my bottle."

As the Tao Te Ching says (Ch.59): "In caring for others and serving heaven, there is nothing like using restraint."

It has taken me a long time to learn this. This evening, I thought that I might finally be making some headway.