Hidden Treasure.

Thursday night I worked at Baskin' Robbins. I worked with Christine, which was a supreme disappointment because Thursdays are always the nights that Luke and I close, and I enjoy being around Luke a lot more than I do being around Christine. It probably has something to do with the fact that Luke and I spend our time talking about stuff like high school, awesome teachers, our favorite foods, and what we like to do with our spare time, whereas my nights working with Christine are full of her critiquing everything I do, her avoiding lengthy conversation, her talking down to me, and me stubbornly resisting the authority she claims to have.

I guess you can say Christine is right up near the top on the "list of people I need to love more," so that's what I've been trying to do recently. I'll follow her directions to the dot, despite that fact that I was taught differently or I know that she's wrong. I'll respond to all her critiques and demands with strong affirmatives - "yes," or "can-do," or "I'm on it."

Needless to say, it was a trying night. (It always is when I work alone with Christine). And yet I had a certain feeling of joy inside me... a feeling of accomplishment and self-worth. I mean, I had gone the whole night without rolling my eyes when she turned away or getting in a pointless argument with her. I had obeyed (to an extent, mind you... I'm still working on it,) Jesus' commands when he said to love your neighbor.

I was kinda in the middle of giving myself some high-fives and pats on the back as I walked out to my car, so it wasn't until I unlocked the doors, turned on the engine, and began brushing the inch or so of snow off my windows that I finally evaluated my surroundings. I looked out over the old, deserted parking lot that once belonged to Wal Mart.

The air was cold, but not a bitter cold. It was more of a mellow cold, with no wind and a soft sort of feel to it. Almost like the temperature wanted you to know that the only reason it was being cold was to produce the snow, and that it was sorry it had to be so chilly. The ground was enveloped in the inch or so of snow for as far as I could see. The low, solid-looking clouds provided a sort of barrier for all of the city's lights, reflecting them back down and illuminating the normally dark surrounding hills. No traffic traversed Highway 395 to my left, so the only noise I could hear was that of my engine.

I felt as if I had come inside a library talking loudly with some Friends, and hadn't realized it until I had crossed much of the floor and sat down. Now everyone in the building - the deserted Wal Mart, the bright but silent electric billboard for Fandango, the two or three abandoned cars around me - were staring at me with accusatory eyes, questioning, what is your problem?

I reached inside and shut of my car, completing the silence, and gave an appologetic wave to my fellow patrons. Seeing only one alternative to driving as a mode of transportation, I began to walk. Again like a library, time became sort of distorted. You know, how you'll go in to browse and end up reading bits and pieces of a book to decide if you want to check it out, and by the time you leave it seems like you've been in there for hours... when in actuality, you've been inside for about thirty minutes.

Such was Thursday night. I walked around for about a week in that parking lot, slipping and sliding in the cold, silent night's embrace. I prayed, walked, sang songs under my breath, walked, watched my breath float away into nothingness, and walked.

I saw maybe a dozen or more cars pass by on 395, and felt a certain urge to go and stop them - to flag them down and show them what they were missing. It felt like they were on their ways to go and try to figure out what they needed. Sleep? Food? Money? Entertainment? No. What they needed was right here. Here was simple, breathtaking beauty bestowed upon such an undeserving earth by a God who loves and cares for us.

Here it was, and all they had to do - all I had to do in the first place - was stop and look for it.


-Daniel