For graduates researching possible interesting and in-demand courses of study, a degree in Conflict Resolution might be one to consider. Lord knows we have plenty of conflict in our world to resolve! Majors in this field are listed by several titles: Mediation, Negotiation, Community Conflict, and Arbitration, to name a few.
Neither Bill nor I majored in this field of psychology, but I know for sure that if you were to ask Bill who was his best teacher in this area of learning, he’d say George Gaither. Bill’s dad was a quiet and patient man. His style of teaching was way more by example than instruction. But as peaceful and steady as he was, there was a memorable issue he once had with a neighbor.
George had cows on his property and a huge garden. He kept his fences in good repair to keep his cattle in the pastures and out of his garden. There was a neighbor who didn’t have transportation at the time, so he took a shortcut into town. He walked diagonally from his house, across the railroad tracks, then, climbing the fences, crossed George’s fields and on to the main road into town.
A time or two Bill heard his dad say, “I’m afraid that if he keeps climbing the fences, it will break them down.” So Bill asked him, “Well, why don’t you just tell him to stop?”
His dad would say something like, “Yeah, I need to talk to him about it.”
Time went by, and one day Bill noticed that there were wooden stiles (small ladders) in three places on the farm fences. He mentioned this to his dad and asked him if he ever talked to the neighbor about climbing the fence.
“Nah,” answered his dad, “I thought this might be a better solution.”
Ah, blessed are the peacemakers. With a few boards and some nails, a situation was defused before it ever developed and a relationship was salvaged in the process.” Win. Win.
Robert Frost in his poem “Mending Wall” says his neighbor kept quoting his father’s axiom, “Good fences make good neighbors.” The poet says he is wont to ask what he is “walling in or walling out.”
George said it this way: “He wasn’t hurting anything walking across the pasture into town.” So instead of forbidding the trespass, he made it easier. These sixty years later, the stiles are still speaking a silently powerful lesson to our kids and grandkids.
If the certified negotiators of the world could have just one course in George Gaither 101, the world might just call them “children of God.” And, anyway, what are a couple of stiles, more or less?
