Treasure Recovered

It is time, I think.

If you come with me, you can watch as I draw the blinds, turn on the outside lights, and touch flame to a stick of incense –myrrh, yes — because it is no accident that darkened rooms with thin ribbons of sweet smoke tend to run the mind down a chute into a holy place. It is Sunday night; it is time to let the holy inform us.

Imagine if you will that someone uses modern technology to locate and contact you. Imagine that this person turns out to be a sibling with whom you never lived, never had a relationship, never shared the quotidian ins and outs of family life. Imagine that this person not only wanted to find you, but is now clearly overjoyed and emotional to have found you, and wants to establish, strengthen, and maintain a permanent relationship with you. With you, because you are the lost sibling she has been seeking.

This, dear reader, is what has happened to me in recent days. I have been unable to focus on this blog or on my writing at all because I have been completely immersed in getting to know my sister, a treasure taken from me when I was but a child, and now returned to me by her own efforts, guided by God’s good hand.

There are great mysteries to be found in this life, and one of the greatest is the scaffolding of memory upon which our sense of self and our view of the world is draped. When that scaffolding is shaken, it can be frightening. But it can also cause things to shift and to uncover beauty and tenderness and worth. This evening, my heart is full, and my mind is saturated with new facts and old questions. But most of all, my heart and my spirit are quiet and shadowy and sweet-scented.

This evening, my heart and spirit are holy. They are set apart, and they are prepared to receive great things.

~ S. K. Orr