40 Ways My Labyrinth is Like My Life--#27

27. Sometimes it's hot and breathless.

This past week, for instance. I can't believe the weather we've been having! All winter was shockingly warm, then we had a bit of mildly cold weather in early March, and now summer has apparently arrived to stay! It's nice to be outside and warm, but it makes me exceedingly nervous about July and August. And bugs this year. Well, what will be will be. We'll either survive it or we won't.

Some people hate cold. They're the kind who go to Florida for the winter. I hate heat. I grew up in the Seattle area where we thought it was really hot when it reached 70. I can stand a lot more heat than I used to, but still get faint and weak and feel awful if I'm out in sunshine above 85. When it's hot and breathless, I either don't walk the labyrinth or I walk it at dawn. Or in the evening, if it's the sort of evening that cools down. (Not all of them do.)

I wish I could make that sort of decision about life in general. Time, I've noticed, goes right on, day and night, ticking away seconds whether I'm awake or asleep, having a good time or a terrible one, paying attention or not. When things seem hot and breathless and I'd give a good deal to get off the treadmill and just stop for a while, I can't do it. I mean, I can make different choices about what to do with my time. I can rest, take a break, do something different. Some of the time I can, anyway. But life, time, circumstances go right on and I keep floating downriver, getting older. . . tick . . . grayer . . . tock . . . farther from the moments I want to cling to, closer to the unknown ones up ahead.

Sometimes, life is hot and breathless. I'll bet Jesus felt that way, on the way up the Via Dolorosa. And you just have to take the next step. And the next. And cling to a God you can't see, even though you feel completely abandoned.

The good news is, as those moments tick by, they also carry us closer to the end of trial and back around to where we can see God's face again. And the best news is, God exists outside of time and can see our faces always. Always.