don’t you love the little moments that make up a life? like sleeping under the stars with your roommate to be wakened at seven a.m. by gently falling rain (actually, to be quite honest, we were first wakened at three by our neighbor dumping buckets and buckets of water off the roof, oblivious to our imperilled shrieks as we huddled at the far end of the air mattress hoping to escape the deluge.) or going to the melting pot at half-ten p.m. for strawberries, cheesecake, marshmallows, cake, and bananas dipped into a luxurious bath of bailey’s & dark chocolate. or dancing around in the backyard in swimsuits as thunder clapped overhead and the gutters did their best imitation of amazonian waterfalls. or discovering a postcard from your beloved describing the wonderment of playing the same organ as bach and liszt played, under a pile of clothes in your room, which you had unknowingly dumped on it after your roommate had brought it up from upstairs and you thought you hadn’t gotten any mail for three days. or filling page after college-ruled page with notes differentiating fusiform muscles from sphincteral, the transverse plane from the sagittal, lymphedema from lymphadenitis, somatic muscle from visceral, all in a beautiful glidy blue pen. or planning an amazing meal for the neighbor boys: baked mac ‘n’ cheese, mashed potatoes, collard greens, cornbread muffins, and apple strudel with vanilla ice cream. or throwing gross scrambled egg remnants at my assistant manager (who’s kinda like my big brother) because he thought i didn’t dare. that’s a dangerous thing to think.

there’s a very odd phrase in mark 6:48, halfway through the story about Jesus walking on the water toward the terrified disciples. ” ⁴⁸Seeing them straining at the oars, for the wind was against them, at about the fourth watch of the night He came to them, walking on the sea; and He intended to pass by them.” as i listened to the lector read it yesterday morning, i was thinking, “oh, yes, Jesus sees us straining and working so hard, and He notices, and He comes to comfort — what? He intended to what?”

He intended to pass them by. i wonder why. and i wonder why He decided to stop, after all.