My watch showed that it was 40 minutes to midnight. Looking up, I caught my own reflection on the window of the bus. Sometimes, the bus vibrates abruptly and the image becomes fuzzy. Staring harder into my reflection, I found out that my eyes were gone! They were hidden under the shadow of my brow and I looked like I had two deep, dark depressions on my face. As my gaze moved downwards, I noticed my abdomen rising and falling with my breathing.
A slightly plump, middle aged lady sat on the seat across mine, left side, and was busy texting away on her iphone, occasionally looking up to check if she has reached her destination. Another man, a few spaces to my left, dressed rather smartly, sat upright with his eyes closed, his briefcase resting on his lap. The fourth and final passenger on the bus was an Indian girl, probably in her teens, reading a comic, with her eyes darting furiously across the page, and her big toes fidgeting sideways as if they were interested in the comic.
30 minutes to midnight. I wonder how these people are like. What their occupation is, where they are headed to, or even what their stand on same-sex marriage is. I’ve never met them before, and will probably never see them again. Yet our paths crossed during the short bus ride. I imagined a ball of thread; numerous lines crossing one another, each one unaware of the layers of threads above or below itself, each merely conscious of its own path. Countless strangers whom I have only seen once have I hurried past in the last 22 years.
If God is omnipotent, then He must know all the six billion and more people on earth. Every person's need, future, fortune, mishaps and so on. "Oh, the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable His judgments, and His paths beyond tracing out! Who has known the mind of the Lord? Or who has been His counselor?" Romans 11:33-34.
12 minutes to minute. My house is just ahead. All of a sudden I thought of something completely random; I wonder what Moses is doing in heaven right now. I stood up and made a faint smile to my eyeless friend, then silently bid goodbyes to the three strangers.
No comments:
Post a Comment