I Have Often Walked

A former unit boy mentioned in a comment on this blog, the Woodside mile between here and the apartment rented by USA Missions from 1988-2001. This morning, I walked that Memory Mile. I remembered how Lonnie would walk there to visit with the Mexicans while they stood waiting for a van to pull up and offer them work. I smiled to remember Ron asking if we have our body armor on, and the mom who asked if it was so that we wore such protection. (We do not!) I passed a school and churches, including the Seventh Day Adventist Church where the young men would come to volunteer at a food pantry. So many memories.

Today, I turned into the u-shaped road beside the Brooklyn Queens Expressway. The forsythia blooms again just as it did in March 2020 when I walked there alone; my husband being too ill to care about going out. The Long Island train glided past, and I happily recalled riding it last evening to meet the NJ tract workers on Long Island for supper.

Today, I walked on past Moore Park. Recently, a city project hung a banner there listing the obituaries of just a few of the 45,000 New Yorkers who lost their lives because of COVID. In the park, men played basketball, board games, and ping pong, Asian women synchronized in fluid exercising. Children played. On a Wednesday evening, the Tibetans circle in native dress to the music of their homeland. This community though having been impacted by death celebrates life.

One day this week, I rode the 7 train along Roosevelt to our stop at 82nd Street. Laurence worked late at the clinic that day, and it being evening, I was hungry. Therefore, I did not resist the tempting taco truck on the corner. I ordered a beefsteak taco: two corn tortillas, meat, cilantro, onion, slivers of lime, and a small container of picante sauce. Muy sabroso! I felt like the luckiest person in the world, standing there with the train rattling overhead, Spanish music playing loudly, people swarming around me on the sidewalk, and that delicious taco (in front of an Asian bubble tea joint!).

I want to use this blog to say thank you for the many prayers for us when Laurence had COVID. I believe it is because of these prayers that today we celebrate life. These prayers give me the faith that one day his healing will be complete.

I give to you the words of the school crossing guard this morning: “Be safe. God bless you today.” Berniece