lightning bugs

(written Friday, July 2, 2010)

Since early June when the heat forced my small community house to keep the doors and windows open at all times, I would find the occasional company of lightning bugs in my bedroom as I was falling to sleep. Small illuminations from nature came to enchant my dreams and make me grin. Their presence was so infrequent, unexpected, and welcomed that it served as the most beautiful illustration for those glimmering heartbeats of romance as well as for all those moments when home is discovered in the most foreign of circumstances.

The Isle of Ometepe, Cafe Hawelka, the taste of gnocchi in Rome, on top of a mountain in Glacier, with the kids at Harka...

And so it is that I just watched Uruguay defeat Ghana in dramatic fashion with other travelers outside a sports pub in Chicago O’Hare airport, and carried my anxious energy to Gate M10 where I will depart for Kathmandu via Abu Dhabi. Just as lightning strikes twice and lightning bugs sneak in to give me a giddy sense of peace before sleep, I am able to see the children once again.

I am thankful for small wonders and simple promises.