airports

just wanted to put down some thoughts I had while waiting in the airport yesterday... thanks for reading



"Love is not an individual possession, but the spirit that breathes through relationships of care ... We have felt a fire in the heart of things, intimated in moments of surprise, a power which guards, judges, and continually recreates life ... we call this fire 'spirit,' this power 'presence.' This presence, felt as mystery and offered as faithfulness to one another, sustains and heals life." -Proverbs of Ashes



Munching on pre-cut vegetables ~ carrots, broccoli, celery. reading for class. A book ultimately on love and a theology on presence within love. Looking up, my senses focus and refocus upon the scene before me. My eyes see so many people and my ears hear a mosaic of voices... not all coming from the people I see, but some projected from the speakers on the tv. Others arrive at my gateways of perception as announcements through the LOUDspeaker ~ flights delayed or canceled for the *unlucky* people, some flights are on time. Mine is not. So here I am, waiting... but am I not always just, waiting? or being? are those two separate modes of existence or just two difference lenses on the same situation? I'm stuck here anticipating a connecting flight in DC, but this airpørt connects so much more than two gas guzzling means of transportation. Presence breathes through this airport like a calming breeze and finds a home in me. I notice what's really going on. We're all here waiting to get somewhere else. Anywhere else but here. But what else is there but what is here. People p~a~s~s~i~n~g time in various ways. Some reading books or newspapers to involve themselves in somebody else's story. So maybe, just maybe, when they look back up from their fantasy, "time" will better suit their needs. Other people eat. They silently say "Let us starve our ability to satisfy our hunger by being happy and content, here and now, through indulgence of our senses in airport fastfood. candy. processed meat sandwiches. coffee drinks overloaded with sugar. alcohol."These people look to food here as a drug. This drug will infuse their moods with a sugary rush of fairy dust that will make them forget not only how wonderful it is to be alive and healthy, but also that they are stuck in this dreeeeary airport. Many other people are on their cellphones. Instead of doing any deep searching or talking to their neighbors in the chair next to them, they are possibly talking to the people they are going to see ~ an attempt to beat time to the punchline and live in the future ~ or perhaps they are talking to the ones they just left ~ a way to soak in the residual emotions of the past. ~ but why is this time, right here and now, not good enough? If we'd only all put our books down, throw away the junk food, turn off the cell phones, and just look around. Just sink into awareness of where we are and all that is going on around us, we'd realize we are not alone. not physically. not emotionally. not spiritually. Time tells us we all long to be somewhere else but here, but it is ~here~ that love exists and pervades all of our beings. Can we for a moment find comfort in being surrounded by hundreds of others just like ourselves? all sharing in the same experience of this airport? Can we offer a smile to the person sitting across from us? Or a kind word to the ~other~ who looks ... not so happy? Can we realize that love exists in this oversized room of waiting and can we approach it with uninhibited emotion? Can we invest ourselves in this love? The love invests itself in us! It connects every person here no matter how distant they feel from what is in front of them. Airports need not just be reminders of the people and places we are sad to leave or anticipating to see. The airport can become not just a waiting area to get from point "a" to point "b", but a middle ground of experience. A focal point in this balancing act we refer to as life. Let the airport actually become a point on the map of our lives. Let it not just pass us by. The airport can become a peak experience! Just take a moment to exist in its presence, soak in its atmosphere, and uncover the love that is binding us all... because as is life, is is a manifestation of who we ARE. and WHERE we are. physically, emotionally, spiritually. Look up and smile. See that we are no more important than any other person there. "Time" is no more personal to you or me than it is to him or her. Love is binding us and supporting us even as we deny it a place in us... reminding us, We are never alone. Love is providing us warmth and comfort even as we look past it towards external stimuli that blind us from its presence. In the airport, here and now, let us all find presence, awareness, and exist uninhibitedly in love.