Day 18: Range

Last night, I thought I’d stock up the pantry with as much Aldi as can fit, but Matt can tell there’s something else in my plan.





It has been a bit of a week.





“Maybe don’t go to Aldi. Maybe just go for a drive.”





The parking lot is empty when I pull in. I’ve missed the new closing hours by 37 minutes. I don’t mind; the 25-minute drive on country roads with windows down and music playing has done me good. The night is clear, minus some thin cloud lines, and the sun is going to bed loudly, shining brighter than it has all day.





Home is a little to the north and then west – straight into the sunset – but I don’t turn on 129 like normal. I keep straight on 177 through Darrtown. There’s an old white barn with a stone foundation that I like to look at when I drive by.





I think about my friend, a nurse in post-op, whose surgical floor has been scrubbed and re-purposed. She worked only one day last week, but any day now, she might be working every day.





I thought about other friends – small business owners I’ve met in the last couple of years – whose businesses rely on people walking through their doors. They’re waiting, too.





The next left to Oxford is at 177 & 73. I keep straight. The big farms start here. I want to sit on all of their wrap-around porches. There’s one farmhouse recently renovated with charcoal siding, white trim, and a black metal roof up ahead. I pass it and turn left on 732, looping back to Oxford.





To the right is the entrance to Hueston Woods Lodge. Matt, Tommy, and I went there for pizza a month ago, back when my mom would pick up the older two boys from school for a Thursday night sleepover. Mom has popped by the house a couple of times to leave surprises on our stoop – books and lego sets for the boys and one time, flowers for me. Today, she dropped off a cookie cake with all of their names written in frosting.





Tommy keeps asking if he can resume his weekly Friday sleepover at her house.





“Can’t, Tommy – quarantine.”





“I do not like con-teen!”





I’m heading into the mile square, but it’s been awhile since I’ve driven to Indiana. The border is three miles west. I turn right and waive at my house as I go by. The sun is still showing off, sitting too low on the horizon for my visor to be of any use.





I used to run on these roads when I trained for races, but I’m more of an in-town walker these days. My sister-in-law is a librarian, and she sent us her first YouTube video of reading aloud. One of my friends is now on Facebook Live and another has downloaded the dreaded TikTok. Two nights ago, Matt and I celebrated a friend’s birthday – 42! – by opening a bottle of red wine and chatting with him over WebEx.





When the road switches from Ohio to Indiana, it’s basically a one-lane with no middle or marginal lines. The big farms start up again, and I wish they’d just institute a farmhouse crawl already so driversby can peek inside. I bet every single one has 5-inch baseboards. I want to check the fireplaces that go with all of those chimneys.





I got a letter in the mail from a friend and read it twice. Another friend texted that she’s ready to expel her kids from homeschool. For one of my friends, the isolation is unnerving. He needs a crowd of people, STAT. for another, the isolation never needs to end. Being at home with her family is her best life.





The sun is going down, and I’m 39. I don’t like driving in the dark anymore. Two lefts, and I’m heading east on Bath Road, which turns into Fairfield Road at the Ohio border. I’m two songs away from home.





“Is it okay?”





That’s what a friend texted me yesterday about what she’s feeling. She’s all right and feels all right.





But is that okay?





I see the range. I feel the range. Every day has so much range, and we can’t disconnect our feelings from the circumstances. A change in circumstances – something as slight as a cough – could render whatever it was we were feeling a minute ago into a distant memory.





I’ve been reading the book of Isaiah for a couple months, and I’m in the 50s now – those chapters where God delivers promise in the midst of a pressured moment.





Sing. Shout for joy. Enlarge your tent and stretch your curtains wide. Do not hold back and do not be afraid. My thoughts, my ways, and my words achieve as I intend. Come, those who are thirsty. I will heal. I will guide. I will restore. Peace, peace.





God’s love is not false. He does not lie to us, saying one thing while thinking and feeling another. He does not promise what he cannot deliver. Maybe this is why it’s so hard for us to receive – we’re not used to words pure like that; we’re not used to love clean like that. To receive God’s love requires more than trust. It requires imagination. We need to see past the horizon.





I turn left and left again. Two more quick rights and I’m back in my driveway. I will go on to draft these thoughts in my journal before I fall asleep. I’ll wake up before my alarm the next morning, read through the Isaiah chapters again, and then pray over the draft before I decide to post it. I will pray for everyone who will go on to read these words.





I prayed for you this morning. Peace, peace in your range today.

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Published on April 03, 2020 03:27
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