Happenings Always Happen

We have arrived at our destination on the West coast (Monterey, CA) after twelve-days on the road and some 3,500 miles over the highways and byways of this America, the Beautiful.  Like every journey there are “happenings that happen,” some of which  are mentionable and some that are not. One of the  happenings for us happened in New Mexico when that abominable “engine light” came on.  I know little about automobiles, but after reading the owner’s manual carefully I decided we could “drive on.”  We’ll have it all checked out first thing Monday morning and go on from there. 

When traveling there are always risks (i.e. happenings).  When I ponder the fact that at 70 mph I am covering more distance in an hour than the pioneers in their wagons covered in a week (if they were lucky) I am astounded.  How, why, did they bother to keep going on?  The land they passed through was often barren land, a land without promise except in their eyes.  It was their vision which enabled them to continue in spite of all the happenings that happened along the way.  Broken axles, impassable mountain passes, sickness, weather—it all happened for them, but they kept on.  And we get a little anxious when an “engine light” comes on!  Or, we won’t go anywhere anymore because happenings may happen.  “Where there is no vision [determination,  dream, hope] the people perish” (or at least wither and dry-up like prunes, or“like a raisin in the sun” as Langston Hughes wrote).

Happenings will happen whether we are at home or on the road.  Happenings happen without any consideration or respect for  timing, place, or situation.   My oldest two grandchildren lost their paternal grandfather last week and as I drove along the highway I felt bad that I couldn’t be there with them.  Yet, I was there with and for them, even from a distance.  Cell phones and messaging technologies are miracles in our midst, allowing us to be there with those we love when we aren’t!  That’s a miracle (“an amazing product or achievement, or an outstanding example of something)!”

Happenings always happen and cannot be avoided no matter where you are or what you are doing.  That’s life—and the only life worth living is the one in which happenings happen.

Odysseus (the Adventurer) has brought us again across this land
--a land that is mine, yours--a land that is ours.