This time last year, I didn’t know we were moving cities, changing jobs, or starting new schools for all our children. Even as I write it, it feels strange that we didn’t know our present reality would exist.
Have you had those times in your life? Those seasons where nothing is like you pictured it would be, not necessarily in a bad way, but in one of those turns-your-life-upside-down ways.
When I was little, our family room which we called the den had two couches and a green carpet. I can remember practicing my headstands up against the support of the couch. I would stay upside down like that looking at the world a little differently.
To be certain this year has made me look at the world differently, not just because we have moved cities and jobs and schools; but also because of the way the divisions among us have been revealed. I am not the first person to note that this feels like a precipice: a moment where two roads diverge, one leading to reconciliation and healing and one leading to power struggles and more divisiveness.
Have you had those moments in your life? When you know what is about to happen will change you and your life drastically?
Those are the moments that become the markers in our story. The places that define us and make us into who we are.
While we might not know how this story endsWe are here for this moment in our collective story. We are witnesses to the rapid changes we are experiencing. We are the voices who will tell the story about what happened and how it happened.
While our lives are being turned upside by advances in technology, changing political climate, and more powerful natural disasters, may these changes remind us to love more deeply and work more compassionately for what is good and just.