The Parable of the Banana

Before I get into the meat of this post, let me just say that I am very, very, very sad that my blog is being lame. As you have noticed, many images are now black boxes with exclamation points in them (except this post because I still had all the photos on file to redo the post). The last two are good. A friend told me that it might be due to the new format of the new design page, but that would be inconsistent of when I lost all the images. I wrote a note of concern to the blogger people but they have yet to get respond. Anywho, please excuse my little rant.

Late this afternoon, I decided that I was in need of snack/dinner. So behaving as a mature young adult, I decided that I would have a large bowl of ice cream. But why stop at just a simple bowl of ice cream? I had hot fudge, caramel, nuts, whipped cream, maraschino cherries, and one last banana in the fruit bowl.

I'll make a banana split. Yum. Plus the banana will make it healthy, right?

Right.

In my banana split, there is a certain order of stacking the goods:

Aren't my paint skills amazing?

So I fetch the banana from the fruit bowl. This is the banana that I find:

Eeeewww! What a nasty looking banana! It's basically a giant bruise. There are some minor gashes in the peel. I don't even want to look inside to see what awaits me. But I do look inside, just for fun. And this is what I find:

Wow. That is not so bad after all. I mean, it's not perfect, but when you compare it to the outside, this is some pretty darn good fruit. It's slightly bruised and there are some imperfections on the meat that reflect where some damage was visible on the peel, but it is definitely edible. Which got me thinking....

How often do we, as human beings, judge others based solely what we perceive?
What good things are we missing out on because we're not willing to see beyond the surface to the "fruit?"
We, like the banana, aren't flawless on the inside. We are impacted by our environment and the things that happen to us, and those influences make a lasting effect.

So as you judge others (we are all guilty of it), consider the banana. Had I not given it the chance, I never would have had the sweet fruit in the bottom of my bowl that contributed greatly to my banana split. Likewise, you may miss out on opportunities to have others contribute their sweetness to your own personal bowl we call life.

Random photo from the mission:

Me and Elder Steve L ridding our nose pores of blackheads. September 2010.