I’m writing this several days before it will slip into your inbox. For some, the difference of twenty-four hours in March of 2020 was the difference between generations. In mere days we went from tepid waters — the bath was warm as the womb, and safe — to an ice-cold world. And I’m reminded again of the difference a day makes.
As I type, it’s an unusual 70 degrees in Kansas City. Virginia and Bo made forts under our deck, barefoot. Their toes are mud-stained because the earth is still wet from last week’s snow. The woods behind our house are naked, but the birds are returning. We saw the first two bunnies of spring on our (winter) morning walk.
Juxtaposed against current events, it seems there’s a story here.
In the afternoon quiet, I begin to think that maybe the story is that spring can still come in winter. February has a rare 70-degree day, and I can be barefoot well before the spring equinox. But I’ll be honest: this concept feels shallow. It doesn’t seem to touch the deep unrest settling into my bones as I watch the world unravel from my kitchen, all while my children play obliviously. I need more than Hallmark-hollow today.
But I know there’s a story here, I say to God.
I can sense that this rare, spring-in-winter day is a form of a message to me. That her tangled hair — leaves and grass and sweat jumbled together — and his threadbare joggers, torn from climbing trees so many of these sunshiney days, are a part of a message to me (and maybe to you).
And I remember Joseph. At the time of famine, God was working another story into his life. Profound loss juxtaposed the early inklings that his most significant personal loss — his family — might yet be revived. A story within a story.
At the risk of seeming to lack awareness for the immense pain happening on the other side of the world … may I suggest that perhaps it isn’t merely the news that is troubling you? Maybe this larger story is touching your story in a way that feels (if you’re like me) profoundly unsettling but also needs the narrative of God.
We are storied people.
You have a history with hurts and unanswered questions and joys and victories that impact how you see and receive everything, from the way your dearest friend relates to you to the headlines in your newsfeed. And yet somehow, when the headlines are large and loud and foreboding, I find myself thinking the headline — alone — is what’s sending me spinning.
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