travel

Christmas Eve Reflections

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“Do you want to push her in the stroller?” my wife asked.

Unhesitatingly, I put down John Irving’s novel, Last Night in Twisted River, that I was reading on the rear patio and hopped up, smiling.

CJ placed Lennon in her new black stroller. Lennon squirmed and cooed, and sucked on her blue pacifier.

It is moments like this when I hear Jim Croce’s “Time in a Bottle” lyrics in my mind’s ear:

If I could save time in a bottle
The first thing that I’d like to do
Is to save every day
‘Til eternity passes away
Just to spend them with you

If I could make days last forever
If words could make wishes come true
I’d save every day like a treasure and then
Again, I would spend them with you

But there never seems to be enough time
To do the things you want to do
Once you find them
I’ve looked around enough to know
That you’re the one I want to go
Through time with

If I had a box just for wishes
And dreams that had never come true
The box would be empty
Except for the memory
Of how they were answered by you

But there never seems to be enough time
To do the things you want to do
Once you find them
I’ve looked around enough to know
That you’re the one I want to go
Through time with

The sun was going down through the pines. Some of the neighborhood dogs barked in the distance at deer down in the branch behind the houses.

I pushed the stroller, Lennon asleep and rocking, as we walked the nighborhood streets. Three kids at the end of the cul-de-sac were playing basketball. A girl skated down the street in what appeared to be new rollerblades. They were a bright pink, matching the ribbons she had in her hair.

I could hear traffic in the distance, the sounds of wheels rolling down I-20. CJ and I found ourselves wordlessly joyful. We just looked at Lennon Ray in her red onesie as she lay in her black stroller, as she nodded to sleep and then would briefly open her eyes as she felt the macadam beneath her stroller’s wheels.

We strolled and strolled. When we came back to our daugher and son-in-law’s home, CJ began cooking fajitas for the adults.

Taylor Ray put Lennon in a bouncing seat on the counter as CJ prepared supper, and I chatted with our son-in-law and played with his dogs.

I sat down again in the wicker chair on the back patio and picked up the Irving novel again, but then put it back down in order to write this. I know what Croce meant in his beautiful song. If I, too, could save time in a bottle, this would be one of those times. Maybe this little writing will preserve it in a small way. Merry Christmas, everyone.

The Wad of Cash

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My favorite time of day is the 30-45 minutes before the sun rises and the first moments afterwards. Especially on clear mornings. That was the case again recently on a flight. I’d gone out to Texas and then Arkansas to minister to some fellow soldiers. On the flight back into Dallas, Texas we were still over Arkansas below. The sky was clear, the sun was emerging, and all seemed irenic. Though the flight was full, folks were getting along and mostly patient with one another. (If you fly often, you will discover such characteristics are not always prevalent.)

Anyway, we landed in Texas safely and I had about an hour before my connecting flight to Atlanta. I patronized a bagel shop for a bottle of water and a breakfast bagel, walked to my gate, and sought a chair to sit down in and eat while waiting for my flight. From the looks of it, this flight to Atlanta was going to be full, too. It is July, after all, and I suppose many folks are vacationing.

When I wathced the people, it was clear who’d been to the beaches or other sunny destinations. The girls and women had on their loose-fitting clothes and their skin was brown with summer. And the boys and men often wore t-shirts and shorts, often with a cap of some sort, with place names like Cancun, Miami, or Cabo Wabo embroidered thereupon.

My eyes perused the terminal for a seat, and I finally spotted two empty ones. I pulled off my backpack and put my backpack down in one seat and I sat in the one next to it. I unwrapped the foil and began to munch on the breakfast bagel and drink the bottle of water. As I finished the breakfast sandwich, I rose from my seat and walked over to the trash bin to discard the foil wrapper and put the now-empty water bottle in the recycle bin for plastics. But as I returned to my seat, something caught my eye. Sticking out from under my backpack was a wad of cash. I simply had not seen it when I took my pack off and placed it in the seat. When I spotted the wad of cash now, I picked it up and asked the people around me, “Excuse me, do you know who this belongs to?” but each person denied knowing who it belonged to.

I put the wad of cash back on the seat, but kept looking around the terminal. Surely, someone will come back looking for this, I thought. Plus, there are cameras everywhere in airports. Surely, it should be discoverable how someone dropped this, forgot it, or exactly what had happened.

But I kept looking around. As people came and went, several times I saw their eyes fall upon the wad of cash, but I just left it there, hoping the rightful owner would return.

Another 40 minutes passed, and still no one appeared for the wad of cash. Finally, the girl’s voice came on the intercom, announcing it was time for my group to board the flight to Atlanta. I picked up my backpack and slung it over my shoulders and boarded.

As I flew back, and the sun rose, I read my book. But my thoughts kept returning to that wad of cash. I wish I knew that righteousness would prevail, that the rightful owner returned, that the good would come out on top. But I just don’t know.

Tales from Travels: A Warrant for His Arrest

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Introduction: I had flown to Texas and then to Arkansas to minister to fellow soldiers. I was in my element–mobile, teaching military personnel, and teaching on topics near and dear to my heart: spiritual readiness and spiritual fitness. I was thrilled to come to see this set of guys again. It had been several months since I had been able to pour into them and to just be with them. They’re among my favorite soldiers–good ‘ole boys from Arkansas, Texas, and Oklahoma, mostly. Salt of the earth patriots. My kind of people.

A few hours later, the American flight landed in Dallas. I had an hour or so to kill until my next flight. I found an open chair and resumed the book I’d read on the flight. I only had a few pages left, and I finished the book.

I’d had to wake at 0130 back in Georgia in order to be at the Atlanta airport at 0330 for American’s first a.m. flight to Dallas. All had gone well so far, though. There was scant traffic at that hour, and I had no significant hassles to speak of, even at Atlanta’s airport.

Anyway, the flight had landed in Dallas, just as the sun was coming up. As far as you could see, it was flat and already hot, even at dawn. I’m not wired for July heat in Texas or much of July heat anywhere else, but that’s another story.

Closer than I Thought: When I took another flight to my final destination, I picked up my ride. My lodging was not ready yet, so I drove to a local bookstore to peruse the shelves. I found a book of Faulkner stories. I’ve read Faulkner for decades now, and respect him now as always. A giant of literature.

Anyway, I gripped the book of Faulkner stories in my right hand, retrieved my wallet with my left hand, and walked to the front counter to pay. A petite brunette with a ponytail and black Books-A-Million t-shirt rang me up.

“Could I interest you in a membership card?”

“No thanks.”

“How’s your day going so far?”

“Fine,” I said.

“Just relaxing, eh?”

I just smiled. I sometimes struggle to engage when the conversation is about drivel. Say something significant, or I’m likely to check out.

“Could I interest you in a gift card?” she continued.

“No thanks.” Honestly, I was starting to get annonyed. Just let me pay for the Faulkner book and be on my way, I thought.

“I had to park close to the store this morning,” she said.

“Sorry?”

She kept cutting her eyes to the left, signaling me somehow.

“My husband … he told me to park right in front of the store,” she said.

I was completely lost as to what she was driving at.

She whispered, “We found out. There’s a man with a warrant between us and the store next door. The cops are on their way. My husband told me to park close to the front of the store, so I did.”

“Oh,” is all I could think to say.

I looked down at the little black pad for me to pay. The total appeared; I tapped my debit card.

“Receipt?” she asked.

“No thanks.”

I walked out, the hot sun blaring down already, my Faulkner book in my right hand. I noticed a silver Nissan by the Books-A-Million, near the bookstore’s entrance. I assumed it belonged to the girl at the register. I sat in the car for a few moments. Waiting. For something. Cops to show? A criminal to become visible to me? I waited. Nothing. No cops that I saw. Perhaps they would come circumspectly, in unmarked clothes and plain clothes. I waited some more. Still nothing.

I sat in the driver’s seat, the A/C on blast.

Here I was, out here to teach fellow soldiers about spiritual readiness and spiritual fitness, and I’d just listened to a girl tell me that a criminal was steps away, a man with a warrant out for his arrest.

I got notice: my lodging was ready. I scanned the parking lot again. I think I was looking for a man to walk in the Books-A-Million, a shady-looking guy, perhaps, but no one entered the store since after I exited.

Reluctantly, I pulled out of the bookstore parking lot and onto the road that led to my lodging. But I am still wondering what happened/didn’t happen.