An Evening Walk

With my husband having to work night shift tonight (something which almost never happens), I clean up my kitchen from our early dinner, grab my keys out of my purse, and go outside to enjoy an evening walk.   I lock the house, hook the key ring across my middle finger, and breathe in the cool, fresh evening air as I step onto our curved red stone walkway, down the driveway, and onto the sidewalk.  I wonder if the same cool breeze once wafted across the faces of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden as they walked and talked with God in the cool of the day.

The orange evening sun makes delicate streaks of pastel colors against the light blue evening sky, and I drink in the beauty of color.  I walk to the corner and turn right, praying for the family who lives in that house, that they would receive Jesus as their Savior.  After I walk to the end of that block, I turn around and come back past our house again and continue on.  Our neighbor's tall pin oak tree has dropped a copious amount of tiny acorns that stained our driveway and crunch beneath my tennis shoes on the sidewalk now also stained by those wee things.  I wonder if the rain will wash the brown streaks away.

I commune with Jesus my Savior, thanking Him for what His death on the cross accomplished for me, for the healing of my hips that ache this evening.

Planted on the ground beside a mail box, a solitary yellow rose is blooming, and the leaves look a bit blighted. The tag says "Victory Rose", and I wonder if the lonely fragile beauty can live up to its name.

Up in the sky I notice a flock of small birds swooping and gliding, enjoying the freedom of flight.  As I near the large field at Weems School, many young men are playing soccer, competing for control of the ball.  My ear picks up the distant faint jingling, tinkling musical sound of an ice cream truck, and soon I see him coming around the bend in the road toward me, the music louder now.  He turns into the school parking lot, hoping the players will buy a frozen treat, but they are too intent on their game.  After awhile, he drives away slowly,  the familiar tinkling music fading on the night breeze.  I ask God to somehow meet the needs of this man's family.

All around me now are the night sounds of katydids, crickets, and other buzzing sounds of insects I can't identify.  My eye catches the sight of something hanging upside-down under a tree branch; I walk over to investigate, and see where a cicada has burst out of his old shell of skin and left it behind for bigger, better things.  I think how this represents a person at death: the spirit comes out of the body, leaving the shell behind to be buried.  But for the believer in Jesus Christ, there will come a resurrection day when we will have a new body to house our spirits once again!

The loud bumping music of a blue sports car growls past me, breaking my reverie.  I turn and go back to the sidewalk.

I hear the plaintive sounds of the downtown Manassas train whistle sounding skyward, filling the night.

Dressed in colorful outfits, three small dogs, tethered to their owners, come out of a house. I greet the couple.  Two dachshunds want to cross the street to where I am, but the woman tells the tiny black one, "That's a bad dog!" and at her command, makes him sit down. :o)

Dusk is falling around me now like a soft blanket.  I approach the house where I know Pastor Yarbrough (not my pastor) lives, and I notice there's a candle burning in the middle dormer window upstairs.  Otherwise the house is dark.  I've noticed the candle in the daytime when I've walked past there; I wonder what the story is behind that candle.

The half moon is bright in the sky now as I take our mail from the mailbox, walk back up our driveway, in across our red stone curved walk, and up the two steps to our front porch.  I unlock the front door and enter the sanctuary of a place called home.

"Thank you, Lord Jesus, for my evening walk."

Copyright © 2012 Elaine Beachy