Warrior in the Sky
02-17-12
“It’s been a long day,” I think to myself as I finally head
back to my apartment. The warm glow of light which pours from the window to the
girl’s dorm door does nothing to displace the chill of the mid-February night.
I wrap my scarf around my head as well as my neck, in effort to keep warm on my
“long” trek down the hill and up another. Having my scarf wrapped so, I begin
my walk in solitude, chuckling to myself at the thought that I might look
French!
The crunch of gravel, the soft squeaking of my left shoe,
the squashing of mud caused by the thaw the lovely sun had brought us earlier,
are the only sounds I hear at first. I feel the cold breeze lift the hair that
has fallen out of the scarf and I cannot help but look up into the clear night
sky.
“There you are, my love!” I say to the cluster of fireballs
dubbed, “Orion,” by the Greeks. He is a figure who has been with me since the
age of eleven or twelve, when I first became aware of him. He was so near then,
I felt I could touch him. Mountains are beautiful things! Somehow they make me
feel closer to God. Orion has become my reminder of hope, love and comfort.
Christ is my love, my protector, my hope…
At the age of eleven, I lived for seven short months in the
third-world country of Honduras. My family, missionaries with an organization
that provided housing and education for those who had been orphaned or whose
parents could no longer care for them due to Hurricane Mitch. The childrens’
center was housed in the capital city or Teguc and had a ranch up in the
mountains about 45 minutes outside the city.
Rancho Ebenezer was my home for about 3 months. We moved
into a log cabin near the top of the mountain shortly after my twelfth
birthday. On a clear night in the winter, the air was chilly, but not the
freezing chill an Iowa winter brings. I was walking up the steep road that lead
from the Mission House to our cabin and I looked up. There he was, my warrior.
He was just a cool constellation then, but I will never forget how near he
seemed. Up there on those mountains, I felt my savior’s presence, though I was
too young to fully understand.
The next time I really contemplated my Orion was a time of
huge emotional and spiritual growth. Each evening, I walked from the bus stop
“Banlieu” to la maison de mes parents d’acceuil (my host parents’). It was
early in the year of 2009, and frequently the light, cool breeze would waft
through my hair and though I was walking by myself, I there were times when I
didn’t feel alone.
I will forever equate those walks as time spent with a lover…time
that neither wants to end. Often times, I would reach the door of my house and
have to keep walking, because I just wasn’t ready for the time to be over. I
wasn’t ready to say, “Goodnight.” These nights, I would talk with Jesus in a
strange combination of English and French, or I would walk in silence, drinking
in his presence. The soft breeze was my love’s hand brushing the hair from my
face, a cool fresh breath on my neck, soft kisses…An invisible love.
Then, if the night was clear—a rare occurrence in Bretagne—I’d
see the symbol of that love…My warrior, poet in the sky. My reminder of Jesus
love and sacrifice and the hope for the day I would share these lover’s walks
with someone else.
Here at Cono, an overcast sky seems rare…I hope that means
my warrior poet isn’t far away.
