I asked Rick how he's coming along with loving and he shrugged.
As you may remember, Rick's primary assignment as a mastery candidate is to learn to love one person--Charlie, specifically. The issue is that he doesn't really like humans, so working with us, as he must to make any sort of difference in the world, is both unpleasant and difficult for him. So the thinking is that if he learns to really care about one of us, he might be more patient with the rest of us. Charlie volunteered himself because obviously he knows about the assignment and won't be confused or offended by Rick acting weird around him as he figures out this love thing.
Anyway, so I asked Rick how it's going and he shrugged.
"I'm treating him well," he said. "Everything I do, I think will this help Charlie? What will Charlie think? I get up in the morning and I plan my day around the man. I guess I'm used to it, now. But I'm not sure it's love."
"How does it feel?" I asked I know Charlie generally defines love as an action, not a feeling, but I have a hard time wrapping my head around that one.
Rick gave me an odd smile, an I-know-that-you-know-that-I-know-you-can-do-better smile, just for a moment.
"I don't mind acting this way, believe it or not," he admitted. "If anybody deserves to be the center of anyone's day, that man does. But I don't know what else I'm supposed to do."
"How do you mean?"
"Well, can I graduate yet? And if not, when can I? What am I supposed to do? It's not like I'm likely to wake up one morning feeling all oogly. This is me, this is what I am, I don't get the warm fuzzies."
"You're growing a heart," I said.
"What, now?"
So I told him about the growing ears exercise Charlie had me go through as a novice, making me count the number of bird species I could hear at any given moment, over and over, essentially constantly, until he judged that my ears had become sensitized to bird song.
"I think he'll tell you when you're done," I added. "Or, maybe he'll test you somehow." I'd already told Rick how Charlie tested my love for the land by pretending there was a logging operation planned.
"Test me? What's he going to do, threaten to jump off a bridge to see if I mind?"
"Don't say that so loud," I said. "He might hear you and think it's a good idea."
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