You ever see a shrine on the side of the road? There are more than I can count on the roads here on Long Island. Crosses, plastic flowers, pictures, and signs. I know they are there to memorialize the death of a loved one and I’m assuming it’s from a car accident. I don’t mean to be coldly objective when describing this, but I’m trying to evoke an image.
I see these shrines daily. On the way to work and on the way home. On the way to practice for my kids and on the way home. To my folks house and when I take a different way home trying to avoid traffic. There must be a hundred on all of the roads I travel.
Then I saw it tonight. A car parked in front of one. No one was out of the car, so I can only assume it was a person “visiting” the shrine. For all I know, it was someone sending a text message or making a phone call or doing anything but not “visiting” the shrine. But what if this person was? It’s Wednesday night at 7:30. It’s January in New York, and although the temperature is above average, it’s not exactly warm. What if this was this person’s routine?
They visit their son/daughter/mother/father/uncle/cousin every Wednesday on the way home from work. They visit on the anniversary of the person’s death.
—
May I sit patiently within all that is good and right in my life and give thanks to God.
—
I don’t have to sit somewhere and remember a loved one that I lost. My grandparents are buried in North Carolina and Long Island. I haven’t lost a close friend or family member. Anyone I’ve lost has not been tragic in the sense of a car accident. No one that I have to go see in a place where maybe they were torn from this world or maybe something worse.
There is much to be grateful for in our lives. There are silver linings and different perspectives. My wish for you is that you see those things to be grateful for and thank God.
