In the past ten days I have been blessed with an abundance of meaningful work. It started on Ash Wednesday when I preached and celebrated the early morning service, spent some time at SpiritWorks, imposed ashes for a couple of hours in the Bruton Chapel, and assisted with the evening service. The next morning I helped make a presentation on behalf of SpiritWorks and made several pastoral care visits. That weekend I co-facilitated the Bruton Women's Lenten Retreat. Tuesday I had the early morning service and the nursing home service and more pastoral visits plus the afternoon at SpiritWorks. Wednesday was a relatively normal work day except for a visit to court to support a friend. Thursday saw pastoral care visits and planning and presenting the evening Lent forum talk on Contemplative Prayer. Yesterday I led a Women's Retreat in Norfolk on story telling.
Whew! By yesterday afternoon, when I had made the drive back to Williamsburg, I was a walking zombie. I laid down on the couch for "just a few minutes" before heading to dinner with Jan, and conked out for a half hour. Following a rich dinner with homemade coconut chocolate chip pecan ice cream for dessert, I decided to walk the labyrinth just to stretch my legs a bit and to wrap up the intense few days.
Once at the labyrinth, I started slowly onto the path, trying to release the work I had done, and thanking God for all the things going well. About a quarter of the way through the walk in, I felt agitated with exhaustion. I don't want to do this, I thought. I just want to go home. I also had to pee. You can't quit before you get to the center. If you want to stop then, fine, but you need to go at least that far.
So I kept walking, wondering if I could keep putting one foot in front of the other when all I wanted to do was lie down. When I got to the center, I stood there. Okay God. My well is dry. I need you to fill me back up, to restore me. I've got nothing left. As I stood there in the heart of the labyrinth, I heard some squawking and saw two Canadian geese flying west. When they got close to the labyrinth, they turned and started heading straight toward me. I ducked, though they probably wouldn't have hit me, but it looked like their flight path was lined up with my head. As I ducked they veered slightly upward and flapped over to the grass on the north side of the labyrinth where they landed.
You're not funny, God.
My mood lightened, and I decided to take the path all the way back out, instead of crossing over the lines. I knew it would take another ten to fifteen minutes, but I thought I could make it before I keeled over or my bladder burst. My step was a little lighter on the way out, and my shoulders felt less slumped. The sun was heading for the horizon, while streaks of clouds began to pinked. Golden light illuminated the upper bare branches of the sycamore tree on the south side of the labyrinth. I hunched a bit inside my coat as the chill air started me shivering.
Squawking began again, and I noticed the two geese had approached the labyrinth. They waddled to the other side of the eighteen inch cinder block wall between the street and the labyrinth. The wall obstructed the lower half of their bodies, but I could see their black heads with the white neck stripes above the wall. As I made a turn in the path, I looked over and the geese were gone! Where did they go? Then their heads popped back up. I giggled. After the next turn, I only saw one head. I stopped to watch. As if they were participating in some synchronized goose choreography, their heads bobbed up and down in time. I guessed they were looking for dinner but the black and white heads disappearing and reappearing from behind the low wall tickled me until I laughed out loud. The geese stopped squawking and both turned their heads to look right at me.
"Yes, I'm laughing at you," I replied to their curious looks. "But it's the gentlest, kindest sort of laughter."
As I walked, they continued their funny game of peek-a-boo until I saw only one head for some minutes. When I left the labyrinth, I had to check to make sure the other one was still there. I kept breaking out into laughter as I walked. When I emerged, I felt refreshed and renewed from my laughter and the delight of the bobbing geese.
Climbing into my car, I lingered, looking west at the sky that had begun to burn orange above the small herd of deer munching their evening meal of grass. The two geese remained between the labyrinth wall and the street, no longer interested in me but curiously searching the ground for whatever geese eat.
It was only later that I thought about the bobbing goose heads and wished I'd caught them on my camera. On the other hand, I'm glad I didn't even think of it, too present in the moment to worry about capturing it for later.
