A few winters ago it snowed. John and I were at the Marriage Conference with three kids and by nine o'clock Ben needed his warm bed. I agreed to take him home leaving John to bring the girls, the guitar, leftovers, and four boxes of name tags. Ordinarily I would have chosen the smaller car, seeing as there were two of us, leaving the van for John. But there was this white stuff.
Perhaps it’s because we lived in California for twelve years, New Mexico for three and Florida for six that I never really acclimated to driving in snow. In any case I was not taking chances. I climbed into the heftier car with Ben.
We made it safely, if slowly, along the bigger streets. We only swerved a bit down Alden Road. But at the base of our yard on Rose Lane we got stuck. I pressed the gas and the wheels spun. I could scarcely see, having only scraped the ice off half the windshield. But in front of me were the bright lights of the salt truck. The driver wanted to come down but I was blocking the way.
Anxiously I let the car roll back into Alden Road, hoping there were no cars behind me. The thump of the windshield wipers, the whirring of the tires and Benjamin’s mounting sense of danger triggered my adrenaline as the truck made it past us. I turned the car off and gave up. John would wrestle it to the driveway.
“We can walk, Ben,” I said as I opened the door. “We are home.”
The noise fell away as we stepped into that silence of new snow. Instead of the claustrophobic feeling of a compact car with no visibility I suddenly felt spacious. Free. I wasn’t scared anymore. My boots would do just fine in the powder that befuddled rubber. It was a quiet ending to a day bursting with friends.
The emergencies that have triggered me over the years... my mother's mood swings, Benjamin's outbursts, political conflict, broken friendships... have been overwhelming when I am stuck inside the confines of my own mind. But for each of those dire circumstances, there has come a moment of emergence. The constriction of fear and uncertainty simply melts away.
It seems to coincide with giving up on my need for control. Then I remember to look up, and notice that home is only a few steps away.
