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Description

Summer Speedos is Neighbourly’s short in-between-season series while Shannon takes a break from regular interviews. Hosted by producer Johan Heinrichs, these episodes mix outdoor field notes and story-driven reflections that help us notice the ordinary ways care, faith, courage, and community show up around us.

What story do we tell ourselves about someone else’s messy yard—or their messy day?

Johan Heinrichs shares a simple encounter with long grass, and how quickly curiosity can give way to quiet judgment. As questions linger, this story sits with that unsettled space between what we see and what we don’t know, where care and dignity begin to take root.

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Welcome to Summer Speedos from Neighborly, our short in between season

series, while Shannon takes a break from her regular interviews. I'm

Johan, the producer of the show. Some episodes are field notes recorded

outside in ordinary places where care actually happens. Others

are story field notes, more cinematic reflections that start with a story

from history or real life. Either way, we're paying attention to the small,

ordinary ways care, faith, courage, and community show up around us.

So grab a cold drink or head out on that bike ride, walk or hike.

Enjoy this year's edition of Summer Speedos from Neighborly.

Hey, everyone. I was out on another walk today. We've got kids

biking around, people walking, staring at me

funny because I'm holding a microphone in the park. But you

know what? You got to talk to someone. And sometimes you got to talk to

something. Anyway, on my walk today, I walked past

this lawn that immediately made me feel very

responsible and, quite frankly, very

judgmental, which is a terrible combination. It

wasn't a disaster. No wildlife preserve signs? No

child lost in the grass. Not that I know of. But it was

long enough that my brain quietly opened up a case file. Why

haven't they cut that? Is the mower broken? Are they away?

Don't they care? Is anybody even living here? And

then, because my brain is efficient in all the wrong ways,

it started filling in the story without permission. That's the thing

about a lawn. It can look like a yard issue, but it

can also become a character assessment if you're not careful.

And that's where I caught myself, because I had no idea what

was actually going on. Maybe someone was sick.

Maybe someone was grieving. Maybe the person who used to

cut it isn't there anymore. Maybe they're working long hours

and the lawn has become the one thing they can't get to.

Maybe the mower broke and the budget is already tight.

Or maybe they simply hate mowing the lawn, which,

honestly, I can't fully understand. To me, it's a peaceful

pastime. And it's fun because lawns are basically

outdoor carpets. But the point is, I

don't know why the lawn was uncut, and I was still ready to write

a story. Now that feels important, because we do this with

people all the time. We see one visible thing.

A messy yard. A sharp tone, a missed

message, a late arrival, outside appearance. Maybe a

child melting down in public. And we start narrating from the

outside. But dignity asks us to slow down

before we simplify someone. Curiosity says

there may be more going on here than what I can see from the

sidewalk. That sentence alone could save us from a lot of

bad conclusions. Judgment is fast.

Compassion is much slower.

Judgment fills in the blanks. Compassion leaves some

blanks unfilled long enough to ask better questions. I

need people to do that for me, too. There are parts of my life that

probably look confusing from the outside. Things I meant to do

but didn't. Things I delayed, things I

forgot, things I overthought so long they somehow

became historical artifacts. I want people to be

merciful with those gaps, which probably means I need

to practice the same mercy when I see someone else's.

There's a line in Scripture about mercy over judgment. I

like that because it doesn't say mercy ignores reality. It

says mercy gets the final word. Mercy

doesn't mean the lawn does not matter. It means my first

response does not have to be the verdict. Maybe the neighbor with

the long grass needs a hand. Maybe they need privacy.

Maybe they need a text that says, hey, I'm doing my yard

later. Want me to run the mower over to yours too?

Or maybe they need nothing from me except the dignity of not being reduced

to one thing I noticed on a walk. So this

week, pay attention to the place your mind writes the story

to quickly. Maybe not the lawn. And when it

does, pause long enough to ask what might

I not know that one question can turn

judgment into compassion? And sometimes that is

where care begins. That's the field note.

Keep noticing.

Sa.