lost and awe

I drove down a back road to a friend’s house
and because I’d made a wrong turn I was now on a
dirt road.
Was I lost?

But seriously, how could I be lost?
I had not driven off the end of the world
and this road would eventually intersect
with a bigger road and at least take me
back to the place I had started.
The roads out there run north and south
and east and west. I rephrased my thought
I am not lost.

So instead of driving quickly
I slowed down and was rewarded almost immediately
with a hawk right there beside the road
and I realized that I would have missed it.
I would have missed it. I stopped my car watching.
The bird seemed pleased to be observed.

So quickly we move through our days.
We may make notes in a journal to remember
but we may not really ‘see’ even then.
What we need even more,
even more
be alert.

Suddenly there, where it had been all along
was a patch of sunflowers being themselves
along the side of the road.
I would have missed them.
Their perfect form and praise to their creator.
And I wondered
if it could be that
I was the first person
to see them.
Did anyone else who used this road
notice them?
A discovery of beauty that led to awe.
I was found
–not lost at all.

God Abide
Bobbie Giltz McGarey
@2006
photo by
Bobbie Giltz McGarey