I don’t often find myself reading the obituary section of the local paper, however, I found myself there out of a necessity to kill some time last November. That’s where I met Sylvia. I was drawn in by her old hollywood glam. Whichever kid of hers was tasked with picking the proper photo to memorialize her deserves a hearty congrats and a strong glass of the appropriate adult beverage of their liking because they truly nailed it.
Sylvia spent her life learning to love the places that she found herself in. In her late twenties, she chose to let go of the green Ohio lands she knew and found all sorts of goodness in this dry and sometimes dreary West Texas basin. She spent her decades rearing babies, honing in on her artistic abilities and growing up (not old) in a land she never anticipated to be her home. Her obituary told the story of a woman hell-bent on giving it her all, no matter where her return address placed her on the map. Plainly put -- she pressed in.
I'll never know the exact reason why I stumbled upon her on a random Saturday morning and she'll never know how much (the synopsis of) the life she lead means to me but I believe it was all divinely orchestrated. I'm almost certain God placed Sylvia on this earth and in this town in part so that in death she could spur me on. As wild as that may sound.
It was as if her obituary was the coffee shop postmortem pep talk she knew I needed. These last words were the confirmation and the recognition of what I had been desperately trying to do for nearly two years.
I had made a similar sort of choice. Sylvia just happened to spend nearly 60 years charting the course ahead of me.
You see, I could have dug my heels in and said no when I got the call that would lead me to the same West Texas town. I could have placed fear in the driver's seat and listened to its terrible choice of music all the way through. I could have told God his plan was dumb and, frankly, was asking too much of me. But I would have missed it all if I had.
I've found wonder and beauty in some of the strangest places over the last two years. Strange being the discretionary word here, as they really weren't strange at all. If even the most aesthetically displeasing regions of the world are worthy of His admiration then they should demand my affection as well. Tucked behind the corners and hidden within the cracks I have found such magic in the mundane because I've looked for it. I refused to play the broken record and get stuck on all the things I could, should, would have any where else.
This dry flat land has been good to me for He he has followed me here. His mercy has given me rose-colored glasses and filled its borders with hope and promise.
Sylvia -- Slyvi (Syl-vee), maybe? --in all her wit and wisdom gave it her all and left behind just enough to remind me -- a stranger who is coming up with nicknames for a woman she has never actually met -- yikes -- just how good it is to live with wide eyes.
“And now, here’s what I’m going to do: I’m going to start all over again. I’m taking her back out into the wilderness where we had our first date, and I’ll court her. I’ll give her bouquets of roses. I’ll turn Heartbreak Valley into Acres of Hope. She’ll respond like she did as a young girl, those days when she was fresh out of Egypt...On the very same day, I’ll answer”—this is GOD ’s Message— “I’ll answer the sky, sky will answer earth, Earth will answer grain and wine and olive oil, and they’ll all answer Jezreel. I’ll plant her in the good earth. I’ll have mercy on No-Mercy. I’ll say to Nobody, ‘You’re my dear Somebody,’ and he’ll say ‘You’re my God!’” Hosea 2:14-15, 21-23 MSG
