I have a thing for early mornings. Even in this quarantine life, with no place to “go”, I have managed to hold tightly to early mornings. There is a sweetness to that post 4:59am pre 6:59am time for me. Perhaps it’s the newness of the day, or the quiet that the rest of the day just cannot seem to replicate, or the darkness that must come to a close for the dawn and the light to come. I get up early out of desire. I make tea, I read my bible, I journal, I put in some goodness out into the world via social media. I send text messages so folks whom my heart has a sweet spot for will wake to them and smile. I write notes, or love letters as I like to call them, and set them aside to put in the mailbox down the street. I also go for walks.
I slide into my tights, pull on my t shirt and fleece jacket with the fun little thumb compartments, lace up my sneakers, pocket my phone and headphones, grab my keys, and head out the front door into the almost light, the quiet, the still. I don’t always know what route I will take. Depending on what I think my body can manage, I loop around Clark Park, or the University of Penn campus before the bridge, or the University of Penn campus over the bridge. I take steps in the pre dawn not exactly sure of what way I will go, but confident I will get what I need and that the light will come along the way.
I launch into the uncertain, fully confident that I will get what I need and that the light of day will come. I never start a walk questioning if the sun will rise. I never worry that my body won’t get some exercise and that the endorphins won’t be released giving me all the good feels. I don’t fret that the early morning looks the same as the late night. I simply start and with each step I expect.
As I stepped onto the slightly uneven sidewalks this morning, I was acutely aware that if I physically can step into and walk through the dark and unknown and still expect light and goodness as the day continues, I am capable of doing the same with anything else that is unknown, dark, or looks vaguely like a past circumstance I have no desire to repeat. Maybe I’ve made a skeptic out of you comparing early morning strolls through west Philadelphia to the squelchability (I made that word up, roll with it) of all of our strange typically unpleasant feelings toward the unknown of the future, especially amid a pandemic with no vaccine or cure to date, especially the future of things we’ve been taught to worship like careers, where we’ll live, settling down with partners, babies (the making, having, and rearing) financial security establishing, etc.
Maybe we’ve gotten really good at complicating the way we meet the future when it rises to greet us, just like a new day- dark, unknown, mysterious, slowly peeling back it’s layers with the light. Maybe we’ve spooked ourselves into thinking that because it is not fully unveiled before us when we want it to be that it won’t ever happen, or will be too late, or we did something to keep it from happening. The day comes whether we are ready or not and lays before us hours, minutes, and seconds of opportunities for us to shape it throughout. God’s grace comes whether we feel we have earned it or not. It is present and available for us and for us to extend to others every hour, minute, second of the day.
The dark, the unknown, the resemblance to a past we’d prefer not to repeat don’t have to unnerve us. It doesn’t have to give cause to pause, doubt, fear, or get cozy with analysis paralysis. We can step into it with certainty that we will get what we need and the light will come. We can go boldly, courageously, hopefully, messy, broken, slowly, step by step. We can go with ideas, thoughts, wonderings and ponderings, with secrets, with memories. We can go into the dark of loss, of grief, of chronic illness. We can go into the unknown of the layoff, break up, failed GRE. We can go into the passed over promotion (again), the rejection letter (again), the miscarriage (again), the divorce (again). When we think we can’t, we can slide into our core identities (those parts of who we are we know and there is no convincing us otherwise), lace up our goals and dreams, put in our headphones that play the carefully curated truths of the life stories we are writing and we can go expectantly into the dark, the unknown, the resemblance of the past, knowing it is a new day bringing with it light, mercy, goodness, grit, and grace.
With Love,
Grit + Grace