Opening Up the World

I walk. I walk because I begrudgingly know it's good for me. I walk because I know that my heart will beat hard against my chest and my lungs will expand to fill my cells with oxygen. I know that even on the smallest level, it is important.

But, my selfish motive is that I get to be alone. I walk most often at night and always by myself. My son has been put to bed, and I leave my daughters watching TV, tucked in their beds, and I make my break. I like to walk outside, cloaked in the darkness, and I like to watch the night sky. I have seen the sky in all sorts of ways. I have seen it impeccably black and splayed with stars. I have seen it with no stars at all, because they are hidden behind the clouds that I know are there but that I cannot see. I have seen a mixture of both these skies; the stars disappear and reappear behind disconnected bodies of clouds crawling by imperceptibly.

I have also noticed all sorts of moons. I have seen full moons, sometimes far away and sometimes orange and filling the sky. I have seen the moon sliced in half, and sometimes just a sliver of the moon, with sharp hooked edges. I have seen the absence of the moon, which makes the night even more deliciously black and concealing. So, I walk underneath all these skies and all these moons and I wrap myself up in its solitude.

One evening, when I was basking in all of this, a fleeting voice in my head told me, "You have to open up the world." My mind does this to me sometimes, throws darts through my thoughts and brings me to attention. My feet moved under me, but my mind had stopped, considering the idea of opening up the world. I imagined the equator the dividing line, hinged at the back of the earth, and my hand descending from somewhere in the universe and, like a toy box, flipping up the northern hemisphere to reveal all the earth's layers, arranged in increasingly malleable and molten strips.

What I knew I was telling myself, though, was I need to open myself up life around me. I so often surround myself in a comfortable cushion of darkness, alone, and I turn away from people and experiences in favor of the safety I find within my walls, away from the possibility of disappointment or hurt. I have often wondered why God would want to put us in situations that cause pain, or to let us suffer loss that seems unbearable. To watch us throw up our hands in disbelief to our situations. It is in times like these that I retreat into the darkness, with a moonless sky above me.

What I realized that evening, when a voice whispered in my ear open up the world , I need to not fear the possibility of suffering or pain. I need to place myself in daylight, to put on display my frailty, for all to see. God did not intend for us to have it easy all the time, but to face the world, with all its wonderful people and places, and its cruelty as well, and to learn from each experience, be it good or bad. I think God wanted us to grow through our life, and to hide away from it only stunts that growth, like a seedling planted in the dark.

I still walk at night. I still enjoy the changing scenery of the night sky, and the different faces of the moon, with its sometimes round, and sometimes piercing shape. But I am trying everyday to open up the world a little more, to leave the protection I find in myself and venture into the light of day.