The Meeting Place

A HEAVY SHADOW OF LOSS ENGULFED ME, my heart was bruised. I could not escape its torment, the garment of sadness restricting my movements. I hurt. The dark night wrapped itself around me as grief invaded my being. I couldn’t go to church even though its doors were open. I had dressed with this in mind—but now I realized the thing was impossible, the pain would be there too. It was Thursday evening on the week of Easter, a holy time of commemoration and celebration, but I couldn’t do it. I had prayed for God to give me the strength to attend the service, instead I let my car lead me past the church through the bright city streets and onto the Skyway, a four-lane expressway leading east from the city into the foothills. In silence I drove up the hill, memories flooding my weary thoughts. I must go back, a U-turn, there—I was descending. The night was quiet, shrouded; few cars made their way up and down the roadway. On the way down the hill, I passed Lookout Point, a rock-face bluff previously known for its view, its suicide attempts and deaths, now newly constructed into an observation point—altering its perception while limiting would be drive-offs. Glancing at its gleaming freshness barely visible in the twilight, I thought to myself, I need to visit there someday, making a silent promise to myself to do so.
The next day in the midmorning hour I found myself pulling into Lookout Point’s parking lot. Climbing out of my truck with hooded jacket on, I walked over to the railing to lean on its strength, looking for a balm to heal my wounded emotions, breathing in the serenity while tears slipped in silent rivulets down my cheeks; cool moisture from the slight mist in the air sweeping my face with its cool refreshment. The canyon was invigorating, with its two walls and its gaping scooped-out appearance. Fresh signs of new-life were cropping out where barren ghost-like poses of burnt shrubs brought back the memory of the previous summer’s wildfire. My eyes closed. An image evoked of fire erupting in bright red-hot explosions in the evening hours as a friend and I watched from a deck facing this same canyon. We wondered how far its greedy hunger would reach. That was then—but this was now, the fire long gone. Rejuvenation in its infancy in silent whisperings began speaking to my inner brokenness—Just like me, time for a new beginning. I continued alone in my contemplation, my privacy uninterrupted as I walked the fence line from rocky point to hanging cliff edge.
I stood there for quite some time before retrieving my notebook from the truck. I began to write. As I wrote my eyes scanned the rough canyon walls seeking to capture every minutia so that I might record in detail the variable forms of nature I was absorbing. I drank in the intricate beauties around me, thoughts flowing from my pen as I captured them on my canvas of words.