This fall, members and friends of WCUC gathered to connect to scripture through creative writing. You can read their writing here and by picking up a packet of other pieces at the church.
This is the day that the Lord has made. Psalm 118:24
Darn… someone took “my” space near the door. I must be late. The escalator is filled…the parking ticket cash line is four deep…should I rummage in my bag and dig out my credit card? I can’t run down the stairs anymore so just won’t make it onto the first train…Thank God for escalators.
Ah… not my favorite seat at the end of the car… but at least a seat near a pole so I have something to help me stand up…glasses on…Sun Magazine open…quiet time in the crowd. Maybe I should get an I Pod so I can really shut out the world like most of my companions on this journey to the city?
Davis Square…more seats filled…Porter Square…every seat filled…two baby strollers, pushers and pushees clearly sleep deprived… one bicycle…Harvard Square…smoosh together…keep reading and try to avoid looking at the standing crotch directly in front of me…Central Square…depart slowly…very slowly and STOP!
“There is a health emergency and there will be a short delay…”
Not in my car, I hope. Did someone get pushed onto the tracks? Minutes pass…must concentrate on my reading. More minutes…why don’t they tell us something? Anything would be better than the silence. I’ve finished my magazine…now what do I do? The Kendall Square hard-charging start-up type beside me slams his computer shut. The U Mass student- type with the crotch in front of me says “Shit, late for class.”
Still more minutes. Conversations seem to have ended.
Ten or fifteen minutes…someone sneezes…do we have enough oxygen in here for all of us to breathe…maybe we need gas masks like the Japanese. No one is speaking…we’re in worlds of our own.
Why am I doing this? I am retired…don’t need the aggravation or the money. Help, I am surrounded by angry frowns.
And then in the heavy worried silence a sweet young voice…
“This is the day…This is the day…
This is the day that the Lord has made
Let us rejoice…Let us rejoice…
Let us rejoice and be glad in it.”
Where is that sound coming from? Angels on the “T?” She is about six or seven…sitting quietly beside her mother…backpack on her knees…singing only to herself…but the whole car becomes her audience…I need a Kleenex…tearful smiles slowly spread around me…except maybe not to the homeless drunk’s face who probably rides the train to stay warm.
The car is moving now… I would love to hug and thank our young singer for her holy message on this miserable ride…and tell her Mother that her daughter changed the day for some very lucky riders…but of course that sort of thing is not done on the MBTA.
Finally… Downtown Crossing … climb the stairs…I just hope that Grassfields Café still has a warm greeting and a bran muffin for me.
~Ann B.