The Trustworthy Conductor
Words by Mari Laine, Toulouse
Though the world says your destination is uncertain, God declares He will bring you home.
The days pass through like long freight trains. Clickety-clack, clickety-clack, clickety-clack. Then Night falls and the rhythm fades out like the horizon, just long enough for me to blink. And we're back to Day. Today.
I feel like I am sleepwalking. The sunnier it is outside, the slower I feel. A week of rain and now the blazing sun bakes the earth. The plants receive all this like divine love: the daisies bloom, the mauve unfurls, and a green shoot of jasmine has burst forth from its brown leaves like a resurrection. But as for me, my head feels too heavy, or my neck too weak. I hide from the sun and bend over this page like a folded up frog.
I don't know the cause of my languor. The Day continues its hypnotizing, slow rhythm. Chores need to be done. Meals to be made. Weeds to be pulled. Schoolwork to be checked. Prayers to be said.
The train carries on to its uncertain destination. We don't know where it is taking us, but that's where we are going. It's a book we cannot open. A library of books that refuses to yield their contents. It is like waiting, yes. But patience is easier when the destination is certain and when there are ample distractions.
What if the post-COVID world is to be dreaded? What if we lose our jobs, our homes, our freedom? What kind of world will my children have to live in? We just don't know. I watch the news, I read erudite articles. We just don't know.
I give in to the clickety-clack of purposeless days, on a train to nowhere. The rhythm of confinement is otherwise comfortable and has lulled me into monotony. Only the plants seem to have purpose, lifting themselves out of the ground, vying for a thumb of earth and a patch of sky. I should be encouraged, but now I am just tired. I watch newborn spiders parachute from out of nowhere, onto the empty chairs of the patio. They seem so eager to live.
Then I remember: There is nothing new under the sun. We have been here before. The destination has already been determined, the answer is known, the future has been secured. More than the virus, more than an economic crisis, more than loss, grief and death, fear God. This is the beginning of wisdom. The days are not meaningless, they have a purpose. The train has a conductor, and He is trustworthy to bring us to the destination. The daily rhythm is also melody. I think I can hear it now.
Words by Mari Laine, Toulouse
May 29
