I can't carry it for you, but I can carry you.

As for the scoundrel—his devices are evil; he plans wicked schemes to ruin the poor with lying words, even when the plea of the needy is right. But he who is noble plans noble things, and on noble things he stands. Isaiah 32: 7-8

Ah, yesterday there welled up in my heart a great desire to be about noble things.  There is no glorious sweep of broad gleaming vistas nor firelit tales of epic merit in the daily patter of Art Festivals or teacher certifications or stopping by Sunflower to pick up some bananas for Igor and Greek breads for Alan.  

And yet.  I am reminded by Sam Gamgee that we are each part of the unfolding grandeur, and even my quiet little bit, plucking a path through the boulders as the setting sun casts dark shadows, has a role, steps to the final climax.  Sam reminded Frodo of “...the great stories... The ones that really mattered. Full of darkness and danger they were. And sometimes you didn’t want to know the end... But in the end, it’s only a passing thing, this shadow... A new day will come, and when the sun shines, it will shine out the clearer... Folk in those stories had lots of chances of turning back only they didn’t. They kept going because they were holding onto something... That there’s some good in this world... and it’s worth fighting for.”

Marco just called. It was a rough day.  Some young twenty-year-old whippersnapper who was doing postgraduate work at his Johns Hopkins program was like, “And what are you doing in this program?  Do you think you have any business here?  Do you really think you are going to get a job at the United Nations?  Here is my phone number if you need my help.”  And as he stood fingering this slip of paper (there is some artistic license here because it was a very bad connection) waiting by the train station, another woman approached him.  She was from Zambia and in the same program.  And even though they do not know much about each other, she started a conversation. “We are called to be light, and even if you don’t feel like doing it, you just have to do it because you are not doing it for yourself, you are doing it for others.  Righteousness is not about yourself.  It’s like smiling, you don’t smile for yourself, you smile for others.” She added something about rich people and the eye of the needle, and disappeared into the crowd.  But this was enough for Marco.  Enough to settle down in front of the stack of textbooks, and start memorizing all of the economic theory and business intricacies, word for word.  Perfectly.  To do it for others.  

We are all characters in the one story, the story of redemption.  And perhaps my job is to just stir up a little rabbit stew, longing for a little salt and herbs, and spoon it out.  Cup by cup.  Spoonful by spoonful.  Until the very last page, and I arrive to step inside the door, and say, “Well, I’m back.”