West End Ave.
I was restless last night.
Didn’t know what to do with myself.
It was hot, but not unbearably so, and I decided to go for a walk, hoping to exhaust myself so that I could fall asleep quickly and be done with the day.
I headed north on Columbus Ave, passing groups of slow-moving friends, walking three abreast. Sidewalk cafes were still full of diners eating late dinners. A dog smiled at me (I swear he did!) as I passed him and his owner around 86th Street.
I kept walking. I kept thinking: about books I’ve read recently, movies I’ve watched, conversations I’ve had with friends. The theme that keeps arising is HOPE. And how I’m pretty short of that elusive substance. Confused by it, burned by it, done with it. Over it.
And how maybe that’s not really an ok way to be – over it. How maybe (as hard as it is, as confusing as it is) I’m called to have HOPE, and my refusal to HOPE is some kind of disobedience.
The sidewalk crowds were thinning out. I had walked far enough north. As I crossed Broadway to loop back home, I tried to convince God why I couldn’t do it – couldn’t HOPE. “I’m wounded, I’m bruised, I’m beat up,” I told Him.
“I have wounds, too,” I felt Him say. And you can’t much argue with that.
Still, this HOPE thing doesn’t come easy. I can’t just scrounge it up, can’t buy a carton of it at the bodega, can’t fake my way through it, can’t strong-will it into being in my life. Even if I wanted to. And I don’t. Not really. Not yet.
Here’s what I can do – here’s all I can do – here’s all that I have the strength to do at this point: I can be open to letting God produce this elusive HOPE in my life. I can let Him be the change that I want to see in my world. I can let Him effect the change that needs to happen in my heart, in regards to this dreaded HOPE business.
I can put it and leave it in His hands. And maybe that’s what He wanted all along.
Didn’t know what to do with myself.
It was hot, but not unbearably so, and I decided to go for a walk, hoping to exhaust myself so that I could fall asleep quickly and be done with the day.
I headed north on Columbus Ave, passing groups of slow-moving friends, walking three abreast. Sidewalk cafes were still full of diners eating late dinners. A dog smiled at me (I swear he did!) as I passed him and his owner around 86th Street.
I kept walking. I kept thinking: about books I’ve read recently, movies I’ve watched, conversations I’ve had with friends. The theme that keeps arising is HOPE. And how I’m pretty short of that elusive substance. Confused by it, burned by it, done with it. Over it.
And how maybe that’s not really an ok way to be – over it. How maybe (as hard as it is, as confusing as it is) I’m called to have HOPE, and my refusal to HOPE is some kind of disobedience.
The sidewalk crowds were thinning out. I had walked far enough north. As I crossed Broadway to loop back home, I tried to convince God why I couldn’t do it – couldn’t HOPE. “I’m wounded, I’m bruised, I’m beat up,” I told Him.
“I have wounds, too,” I felt Him say. And you can’t much argue with that.
Still, this HOPE thing doesn’t come easy. I can’t just scrounge it up, can’t buy a carton of it at the bodega, can’t fake my way through it, can’t strong-will it into being in my life. Even if I wanted to. And I don’t. Not really. Not yet.
Here’s what I can do – here’s all I can do – here’s all that I have the strength to do at this point: I can be open to letting God produce this elusive HOPE in my life. I can let Him be the change that I want to see in my world. I can let Him effect the change that needs to happen in my heart, in regards to this dreaded HOPE business.
I can put it and leave it in His hands. And maybe that’s what He wanted all along.
1 comment:
Hope is the word of the year! Here's to it overflowing for the months to come...
-md
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