On The Road. Did you know that infamous Beat author Jack Kerouac was a Catholic Christian? So was Andy Warhol too, but that's a different story. Studio 54 aside, I climbed in the rig, got on the road and headed West to say Mass.
The church was quiet and beautiful in the evening light while Christ came down to earth to lift us up to heaven, O Salutaris, and time stood strangely still as it always does when we worship God, not least in the Sacrament of the Altar. Then all too soon, "The Mass has ended, go in peace to love and serve the Lord." Ite Missa Est.
Back in the car park the sun was setting over Texas, no small thing, and I sent the record of it to an old friend who finds himself in LA doing something with pop music. "Look!" I whatsapped, "Sunset. Hope your musicians are behaving themselves."
Apparently they were, "Big empty production stage. Phase 1 rehearsals. Secret location. All chilled here. Easy. STAY FROSTY." Always. Then back on the road to the Compound with the sun filling the rear-view with its golden radiance. I never tire of the vision and thank God for it, seriously, and therein lies a word to the wise.
Try and make a habit, a discipline of thanking God for the beyond reckoning good that he's given us. Perhaps it's easier to see in the countryside, where creation's comparatively less marred by wickedness than in, say, the DFW metrosprawl. But wherever you are the rule applies, and when followed covers a multitude of sins.
Here Endeth The Lesson,
LSP
This week I'm thanking God for an outcome of a family member crisis. The resolution isn't one I envisioned but it is a solution that is working. Praise God.
ReplyDeleteEvery day is a gift from Him!
ReplyDeleteInfinite blessings require infinite thanks.
ReplyDeletePTL, WSF.
ReplyDeleteEvery day, drjim, and I have to remind myself of that.
ReplyDeleteLL, the Holy Mountain.
ReplyDeleteOn clear moonless winter nights in Korea, on guard, two small villages visible from a hill top, dark outside the wire, there were more stars than even in the Texas countryside. The Milky Way was as though God had swept a hand across the sky, leaving his imprint of diamond dust. Sunsets, though – God graced Texas with the best of those.
ReplyDeleteI love that short story, Sgt.
ReplyDeleteLSP: Thank you. Walking guard six hours a night with a sentry dog gives plenty of opportunity for thought and even for a few words spoken aloud. Duke could not speak back, but he could look up and grin or otherwise agree. Before wealth, Korea was dark at night. On nights winter clear and midnight black, the universe was as visible as likely possible, no clouds, no industrial air to hide the stars. My time was 1965. I was 19. My oldest did his tour in 1995. He was 18. By then, the air had thickened, oil lamps in thatch-roofed mud brick farm houses were gone, replaced by electricity and more modern houses. Warmer in winter, but as always, something is lost to progress.
ReplyDeleteThat strikes a chord, Sgt.
ReplyDeleteMy eldest tells me of a night like that last year, he was out in the country -- "It was like stepping back in time."
Love "On nights winter clear and midnight black..."
Reminds me of my sister in law looking towards DC from a then house in suburban ghetto MD. "What's that orange glare?" she asked, "That, darling, is the the light of the city." You couldn't see the stars.