Choosing Faith

When I left the community college and started writing this memoir, my attention turned inward. I stayed at home most of the time, reading, writing, and lying around. I seldom exercised or saw friends. But just a week or so ago it was as if someone hit the On switch. As if I suddenly poked my head out of a hole (much like Punxatawny Phil) and looked around. I felt a need to move back into the world. Signed up for fitness classes at the Y and contemplated tutoring a kid or two.

I also started talking to God again. This long hibernation and inward search had brought me back to what I needed most—to feel reassured of something beyond the whirling turmoil of Trump, mass shootings, the climate crisis, wildfires, and now the global pandemic. I feel I must choose now at a deeper level, whether I will believe in the world that appears so cruel, so dangerous, so pointless—or one permeated with love, beauty, and meaning, offering a loving presence that can be trusted to accompany me through the severest troubles.