For Wilshire Baptist Church
My absolute very first conscious memory is looking out upon a montage of sharp black and white shapes, feeling frightened and crying at the confusion of the contrasts, and yet sensing safety in the clutch of a hand holding mine. All my senses seemed to be firing in that moment, and maybe that’s why I remember it before all others. I’ve asked my mother about this, and she says that in the winter of 1960 when I was one year old, it snowed in Richardson, and she thinks she probably took me out on the back patio to look at the white snow beginning to cover the black dirt of the new, grassless yard.
Looking out the window today, I see a similar scene – shades of white, black and gray. I’m not at all frightened as I was as an infant, but I’m also not excited and eager as I was through my youth and younger adulthood when the sight of snow would draw me outside to play or at least want to play. It was magic and sometimes even romantic, like the time I heard a knock on my bedroom window after midnight and I snuck out of the house to walk the snow-covered neighborhood with my high school girlfriend and one of her pals. And, of course, you always want the snow to be deep and plentiful when you’re up on the ski slopes. I’ve tried to ski when the coverage was poor, and it can be just plain dangerous if you hit a dry spot at full speed.
But today? I’m just ready for the snow to melt and be gone. Actually, it’s the temperature I don’t like. A little snow for a little while at 29 degrees is nice and pretty. But this deep freeze on top of the pandemic and the limitations it has added is just too much. We’ve turned down the thermostat, the dripping faucets sound like Carlsbad Caverns, we’ve had rolling blackouts nipping at our noses, and we can’t travel anywhere. Okay, we can travel and we will if we need to, but not without some risk and discomfort.
Looking out the back windows, we see squirrels and birds tending to their regular business of digging and poking on the ground. Yesterday we saw a large, fuzzy black cat sniffing around an opening under our back porch that I need to close up when it gets warm again. And this morning we saw a new large animal track that meandered through our backyard. All that to say that in general, the so-called “lesser” creatures of the earth don’t seem bothered by any of this at all.
I remember Jesus saying something about that – how the lilies of the fields and the birds of the trees don’t worry about food, shelter or clothing. I wouldn’t go so far as to say I’m feeling worried; more like inconvenienced and irritated. Our Ring and Nextdoor apps are pinging nonstop with reports of power outages, pleas for spare firewood, questions about frozen pipes and such.
I just want things to be what I consider normal for winter in North Texas: cold and dry today with a good chance of balmy tomorrow. It was that desire for “normal” that prompted my parents to load up the car and move home to Texas from Montana six months after I was born. They were sent to the Big Sky by the Air Force, and they have fond memories of how wonderful it was in the spring and summer. I’ve been there in the summer and early fall and agree. But the winters? They had enough by the time I was born in late January, and with the next move by the Air Force likely another location along the northern tier, including perhaps Iceland, it was time to go home. I’m grateful for that.
I also should be grateful that for a few days the weather seems like a bigger deal than the COVID virus. In my imagination, I want to believe that the freeze might burn away the virus and we can all walk out freely and safely when the earth warms again. But I know it doesn’t work that way. So for now, I’ll watch the birds and squirrels carry on as normal from the windows and continue to have faith – that same faith I had when standing on the back patio and sensing a presence with me who would keep me safe.