Thrum Thursday

Thrum – the end of warp which is not woven but remains on the loom when the woven fabric has been cut free.

“One may have a blazing hearth in one's soul and yet no one ever came to sit by it. Passers-by see only a wisp of smoke from the chimney and continue on their way.” ~Vincent Van Gogh

Van Gogh is my favorite artist. I love his work. And I love his story. This quote of his makes me think of all the people we simply walk by in a day and don’t really know what’s inside them…. What are they suffering today? What are their joys?  What are they going home to? What are they running away from? Like his street scene here in Café Terrace at Night, there are so many people we see everyday, people we sit beside in an office building, pass money to at a cash register, smile and say hello to at church. People with a blazing hearth who we see as only a wisp of smoke.

Yesterday on the way home from taking Mary to see The Help I looked in my rearview mirror and saw a neighborhood mom run into the road, look both ways, then grab her head before turning around and running back to her house. For a second I thought I would just keep driving… we were just a little way from home. Mary had a ton of homework and it was already after 7pm. I was exhausted and ready to get into my pj’s. I didn’t even really know the woman. Mary is getting to be friends with her daughter. Her husband and I worked together briefly many, many years ago. But, really, she was just a wisp of smoke to me.

But I made a u-turn and went back to her house. I already knew what was wrong. I recognized the panic. Her youngest, a six-year old boy with Down’s Syndrome was missing. “He was just in the garage! Just a minute ago!” she told me. She already had her older children out on bikes looking for him. I dropped Mary off at home to tell her Dad what was going on and to enlist his help. I then began driving around the neighborhood looking for a small boy I had never to my knowledge set eyes on. I kept coming back to our neighborhood lake and peering down the grassy edge by the water, praying, “Please, God, let him be safe.”

An hour later as the sun was setting my own mother-panic was beginning to kick in at the thought of this boy being lost in the dark. The police had been called and many, many other neighbors were out helping… on foot, on bikes, in cars. And then…. the boy was found! I was told he came riding home in a golf cart sitting on an elderly gentleman’s lap. Ah – blessings and glory and honor and all praise to the Lord God Almighty!

I’m glad I didn’t continue on my way yesterday. I’m glad I turned around and went back to ask what was wrong. I’m glad I had the chance to try to comfort this mother whose sufferings and joys are played out so close to me but who I know so little about. And frankly who I had never stopped to even consider.

I spoke to many neighbors I hadn’t spoken to in years probably as we checked in with each other to see if anyone had found him yet. So many people that live their days and nights so close to me yet who could just as well be living in another state. I watch from my window as wisps of smoke eek slowly from their chimneys.

I would like to do better.

Luke 10:25-37 ESV
And behold, a lawyer stood up to put him to the test, saying, “Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?” He said to him, “What is written in the Law? How do you read it?” And he answered, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind, and your neighbor as yourself.” And he said to him, “You have answered correctly; do this, and you will live.” But he, desiring to justify himself, said to Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?” ...