Last weekend, I was invited to speak at a Gandhi conference in Pomona.  It felt like most of the leading Gandhian scholars in the West were at the conference, along with many educators who cared to bring non-violence in school curriculums.  Amongst the impressive roster of speakers, I was definitely the least educated and the least published. :)

I spoke about the gift-economy in the context of Gandhi's "soul force" movement.  After the talk, a young man comes up to the mic to ask a question.  I respond: "Before I answer, I gotta say that's a cool t-shirt."  He prompted back: "Yeah, it's great.  People always do a double-take and say, "got asthma", "got amisa", "what does that mean?"  And it opens up great conversations about Ahimsa, non-violence."

The next day, I was gifted two other t-shirts like that. I gifted them forward, precisely because I thought it was so cool. That's gift-economy in action. But Rich, that young man who asked me the question, came up to me also and said, "I have an offering for you." While handing me a folded t-shirt, he adds, "It's a bit smelly since I haven't had a chance to launder it."  Wow.  His own t-shirt.  That's soul-force in action.

That kind of stuff really moves me.  Not only did I share Rich's story several times, but I hung on to that t-shirt for a while ... until the next day, as I shared the story with Chris and felt moved to gift him the t-shirt. :)

Rich: wherever you are, a bow of gratitude to you, my friend.