Against All Odds

What lingers?

• After the scrumptious meal
• After the company leaves
• After the last note sounds
• After the riveting movie
• After the compelling book
• After the lights go down
• After

Our hearts and senses are left to fend for themselves. To remember, but not with our minds exactly, more with our spirits. We no longer have the crutch of words or explanations or analysis. We can no longer touch or taste or see or hear. But we still feel. Something remains.

What is that?

It’s real because it returns. When circumstances bring it back to mind. It is like the last time – like before, like the other. We compare it to something we know but could never display. A thought, a memory, a sensation, a feeling. These have not gone; they are still with us. Undeniably present and called upon by the moment’s experience.

My pastor speaks of the blessings of God for which we tremble. I repeat the word over and over as I was taught to sing it, in a choir loft long ago. Rolling the last consonants, as if they were bumping together, quaking, quivering, rattling, rumbling, settling. The dictionary is far, far away. I stand two rows up, eyes fixed on a makeshift manger to which we sing. I have imagined the baby Jesus. We…tremble…

Why would Jesus come as a helpless baby? Crying, cooing, needing, cold, trembling…

I glimpse a young woman from a wasteland who is isolated, devastated, alone, being held by the man who has stood by her. He can comfort and support but not rescue her. This is a present day and not just long ago story. It still resonates. Perhaps because it speaks to a place deeper than words. Where, trembling against all odds, we discover that what is in us can save us. 

It lingers.