In the early morning light, I step out onto the old stones of the back step. The autumn air blows cool, fresh, from the northwest, tugging at the hem of my skirt, wanting me to come too. Not today. I have laundry to hang today, warm bread dough to tuck into loaf cradles, floors to scrub while bread babies rise under dishtowel blankets.
Old wooden pins between my teeth, I string laundered white towels like flags under the spruce trees. The towels flap, snap, clap in the crisp wind. I swoop and clip, dive and link, necklace of clean stringing out. Towels batter higher, slapping, whipping. The wind blusters, a pin pops, towels flail…then a gust lashes one down to the ground.
I know.
I drop the pins into the old tin bucket and step off the walk to rescue the pitched one. Gathering the crumpled damp up, I understand. There are days the winds blow hard, seemingly too hard, and pitch me too. Buffeted and blown about, flailing and flagging, wouldn’t it be nice if someone would just reel the line in?
I don’t.
True, these windy days pummel and thrash. And I
could just surrender and dry in the stale of the house. But the wind is so alive, so free, so real. Do I want to miss the full of the real?
I clutch more pins, drape the towel further over the line, and snap more pins on. More pins to
cling tighter to the line.
Windy days? Battered and flailing?
Yes, O Heart, me too.Let’s snap more pins on.
Sing more. Pray more. Trust more.
Cling tighter. The sun will come out soon. Until it basks down, warm and peaceful, we'll
cling tighter.
And let Him fly us high.
Lord? Storm winds may blow. Cause me to cling tighter...so I can fly higher up into You, Father.
