Midnight Prayers - this entry is for Melissa, and all of you who want to read a real life fairy tale
Midnight Prayers
Originally uploaded by professional daydreamer(a real life fairy tale, taking place in the usually starless-at-night-Berlin)
Rain is clutching against the windows of a delayed train I am sitting in right now, and I am reading some of the words I scribbled down last night - or rather this morning.
It was a beautiful night that began with a concert of my favorite comedian in this country, and it ended with us crashing in our beds hours later.
The concert was marvelous, truly marvelous, but I didn’t want to stay as others to get autographs and such, I wanted to get a breath of freshly dirty city air, and I wanted to walk. Nora and I starting wandering off, and suddenly we found ourselves at the Gendarmenmarkt, one of the nicest plazas in Berlin, for sure. A guy played the violin (beautifully) and we stood and I got overwhelmed with thoughts and memories, of when my grandpa died and a great gesture of comfort and love the Sunday after. It all came back to me, and so I told Nora I wanted to walk. And that I needed to talk. So I started and went on and on about those marvelous friends and that memory and my so often feeling lost and my lack of trust, my lack of faith lately.
(just right now as I read over what I wrote on the train to publish it I hear these words sung: "I once was lost but now I'm found")
I bought an American (well…American-style) cookie, and we kept on walking. Both of us, we didn’t want to take a train home, because the night was much too beautiful. So we walked, and talked, and laughed, and were silent, and then we were at the place where the river Spree runs between government buildings. The buildings were all brightly illuminated, all we could see were silhouettes of people passing by on their bikes, and then suddenly, when all was calm, we spotted a rat running along. It was such a strangely beautiful sight, that rat-silhouette, the reflections of light in the river, Nora with an umbrella even though it did not rain and the sun that the umbrella could have protected her from had long disappeared behind the horizon.
Some of Anne Lamott’s words were on my mind, and suddenly, I could hear someone sing and play the guitar. We walked a little further, stopped right between two government buildings, sat down at the bank of the river (it was all concrete, so city-ish) and were silent.
Suddenly, just about 2 yards from us, a heron set off, flew closely above the water and disappeared in the dark, while a fish jumped, as if taking a leap for joy, thanking us for saving his life by scaring off that bird.
The guy on the opposite side of the river started playing something I couldn’t help but sing along to. “I’m a creep, I’m a weirdo, what the hell am I doing here, I don’t belong here”, but more then ever, I felt like I belonged right there, right at that moment.
My mind was racing, filled with words and phrases that rang true when I first heard them, and that still ring SO true for me.
God is doing some amazing things when you are desperate, and when you need to be filled up with hope again. When you can’t trust anymore, when it’s a struggle day and night and you start confessing it, and telling God, she fills you up again.
The guy with the guitar got up, walking past the one government building, leaving us to see his silhouette and that of his guitar, and a black couch that stood in the nothingness of a concrete wall, in front of which are stairs and then glass.
From behind us two people approached, a couple, he slightly shorter than her (but that might have been due to their choice of shoes), she was wearing a beautiful beautiful dress, he wore a suit, and she was talking to him with the most adorable British accent.
I felt like I might have to explode. There was a shooting star.
(and the craziest thing is that I am not making this up.)
Nora and I looked at each other, silently agreeing that this night was way too beautiful to get on a train again, so we enjoyed our nightly real life fairy tale and got up, walking. We came onto a bridge, and there we ran into the guy with a guitar…whom we talked to for a few minutes. He had some whiskey (I know, strange, but it was so fitting since just moments before I told Nora that God really IS my whiskey from time to time), and so I had a sip for Meliss (may Drunkard's Prayer be true for you in your relationship with God, but as well with Jonathan.), and then we kept on walking, wishing him a good night, almost exploding for joy.
Or at least, I was. I looked at my watch and realized that Melissa’s wedding service must have been over just about that time, and I told Nora, and so we prayed. In English. I had my eyes closed, walking there next to a river, simply trusting that I wouldn’t drown, next to Nora with her opened umbrella. I was SO at peace at that moment, and all the worries I went through the past weeks and days seemed to not matter at all. Because I am not in control, it’s all up to my beautiful Savior, my wonderful King.
And before we knew it, we were at a place were the grass was artificially rained on - with water splashing on the umbrella.
Last night, in Berlin, I could see the stars.