A Divine Plan or a Divine Run? Post #2

Wind Running

While jogging yesterday morning, I was flying.

This wasn’t the first time. On windy days, especially in the penetrating winds of early spring and the surging winds of autumn, to run is to feel wind-borne. There is a sense of being caught up in it, of sharing the wind’s effortless power.

Of course to begin with, the work of running is made easier when the wind happens to be at your back – as though you were buoyed up like a kite, or gliding over it like a bird. Sometimes big gusts almost seem to lift you from behind.

Then you begin developing some skill with the wind. You not only make use of it when it’s at your back, but also learn how to lean into its resistance when rounding a corner and it’s coming at you from the side. Heading straight into it, you discover how to keep a low profile. You learn how to avoid wrestling with it; how to let a wind-surge slow you down a bit so that you’re not at odds with it and having to exert a lot of extra energy in order to continue moving forward. I think there’s a metaphor for life here concerning adversity and how to deal with it.

Then there’s the matter of the distracting tumultuousness of it all. The boughs that move and branches that bend before your vision, scattering twigs and leaves on the ground at your feet. The swaying trees, near and distant, with their vast, long repeating shouts of “Hurrah, Hurrah!” that swell without ever completely subsiding to dominate the whole sound-scape. And so the cars on the nearby street pass in tremulous whispers, and a boy streaks past furiously pedaling a noiseless bike. The entire visible world is transformed by what the wind is doing; everything is touched, stirred, invigorated. If your body is tired, you’re not noticing it because the whole world is at an angle and your senses are reeling with the feeling.

Eventually your own movements, occurring in the context of the general uproar, blend into a feeling of not being your own movements. Everything is moving: the crumpled what-not scuttering crab-like along the asphalt, the leaves streaming lightly passed like victorious little marathoners, the tops of trees swaying like banners. And your arms swaying at you sides, and your legs stroking to gain the ground, all become part of that same panorama. Add to this the permeating chill of wind just cold enough for your body to accept into itself and enjoy without difficulty, and you begin to feel that you live and breathe the same vitality that makes boughs bend and branch, the clouds billow overhead, the wheel-rolling combustion engines combust -- the earth turn. You no longer seem to own the energy you spend, with the result that expending it becomes an easy, free, and joyous gift – uplifting gift, as though your own feet belonged to the larger purpose of helping spin the go-round of the ground we tread.

Partnering

We are the ones with divine plans and preconceived notions. God is just going, just running, knowing the direction.

God may be looking for a running partner.




Copyright Paul Martin 2005 all rights reserved