I got a very powerful message this morning from Jody Abrahamson, a reader of the blog, whose husband has terminal brain cancer. She heard my voice post yesterday about prayer and wrote me about her own search for a quiet place in the pain of her life and the anger in the world. It touched me deeply and made me feel good about this new way of telling some stories and protecting the space in my head from social media and the hordes of angry arguers in our country.

I went to read Jody’s message aloud as I sat next to a new treasure in my life, a new discovery, our own private water fall in our own woods, newly accessible to us, thanks to the Ed Gulley Memorial Bridge.

I get a lot of messages and don’t always see them all, but I believe the ones I am meant to see find me.

Prayer has become important to Jody, as it has become important to me. I do not look above to a deity for prayer, but inside of me, and in the world around me, a new way for me to think about prayer.

Jody’s message humbled me, and I dug out one of my favorite Thomas Merton writings about prayer and humility. Life humbles me every day, even as it makes others more arrogant and angry.

“The lights of prayer that make us imagine we are beginning to be angels are sometimes only signs that we are finally beginning to be men (and women). We do not have a high enough opinion of our own nature. We think we are at the gates of heaven and we are only just beginning to come into our own realm as free and intelligent beings.”

This is where I am in my prayer, I am in my 60’s and just beginning to come into my own realm as a free and intelligent being. I think some angels live in my water fall, I sometimes hear them singing and dancing in the stream of water. I am thinking of Jody tonight, her message was a prayer in itself. I am grateful that she wrote to me, and that I saw her message.