Springtime Season

My Lord God, I have no idea where I am going. I do not see the road ahead of me. I cannot know for certain where it will end. Nor do I really know myself, and the fact that I think I am following Your will does not mean that I am actually doing so. But I believe that the desire to please You does in fact please You. And I hope I have that desire in all that I am doing. I hope that I will never do anything apart from that desire. And I know that, if I do this, You will lead me by the right road, though I may know nothing about it. Therefore I will trust You always though I may seem to be lost and in the shadow of death. I will not fear, for You are ever with me, and You will never leave me to face my perils alone. -Thomas Merton, Thoughts in Solitude

The last time my blog was so silent and sporadic, I announced several weeks later that I was pregnant with Little Bee. There's no new baby this time around but this springtime season has been a remarkable time of creation within me. Two months ago I looked around at the emerging life in nature and wondered what new life was being awakened within me. And what a two months it has been.

But how to put words to it? I've been stumped, and therefore silent. Some things cannot be described directly, only circumnavigated, told in metaphor or story. So here is what I have written to convey my experience:

I have been on a long journey underground. My travels have been through caves and tunnels, with beautiful sights, parts of nature I have never seen and hadn’t been able to imagine. I had no sense of heading towards an ultimate destination but was wholeheartedly enjoying the journey itself. Each new cavern contained such lovely, breathtaking views and wonders. I had no intention of ever ending the tour.

But now suddenly I take a step and find myself burst into the light. And not only have I emerged without warning into daylight but I am standing in the most beautiful, the most glorious place of them all. Suddenly my entire trip is cast in a different light – what I enjoyed as an end in itself I now realize, with surprise and joy, to have been primarily a process, a building up, and without realizing there was a destination I have arrived.

Looking around in this glorious, awe inspiring place I know that I could never have been persuaded to come here, nor would I have ever found the way directly. Instead the journey I have been on has led me here. The gratitude that I feel is overwhelming, as is my surprise. And with these comes the certainty that I have been led, that I have not been wandering aimlessly and alone at all. And the certainty of this realization leaves me in awe and silence.

So there is my metaphor, an explanation for my silence, an invitation to join me in this Springtime Season, and a song of praise. To you it feels like I have said nothing, but to me it feels like I have said everything.

The Lord is near.