The creaking is definitely getting slower.
creakcreakcreak creak creaaaaaak…
The wheelbarrow trundles to a stop. At least I think it’s stopped, an unsettling sensation after having traveled so long. What’s wrong? Why did it stop? And where?
I unfold my crumpled form and survey my arms and legs. Flakes of rust and dirt dot my limbs, a bizarre rash, an allergy to this ancient barrow I’ve been inhabiting far too long. My body is sore, hair limp and knotted. I hazard a peek over the rim. A meadow, not sunny, not shady. Just a neutral meadow. All I hear is moving air, a stiff wind carries dead leaves that came from somewhere. I feel nothing. I feel dead. Am I dead? Only the complaint from my limbs crammed into this inappropriate vehicle and the constant ache in my heart remind me I’m still quite alive.
I sit up and look around. Where the hell am I? What is this? There doesn’t seem to be anything except a path, a grey ribbon leading into the horizon. When I was moving, the stony crunch sounded oddly satisfying, at rest it’s too quiet. I sit in the rusty wheelbarrow and wait, abandoned. I look forward and peer into the distance, squinting in a vain attempt to see farther, but the gravel path just winds into the horizon, nothing to see here, move along, ma’am.
I look behind, but as I strain my eyes to see farther, I fail miserably in doing so, noting the same dead end at the horizon, the same lack of any activity, the lack of anything at all, save the eternal grey strip of path winding forever. There’s nothing at the end of this Mobius path, in my heart I know there is no destination at the end of this road.
I have been left in this field. I sit puzzling, not quite sure what to do, wondering whether I am in a good or bad situation. I contemplate. I debate. I have tried so many things, yet still I keep winding up hauled off in this damn rusty wheelbarrow. An awful vehicle, you go nowhere unless someone comes along and pushes it, and then they take you where they want to go, your destination forsaken to the control of the driver. It really is a dreadful method of – WHAT IS THAT?!
I can just make out a shimmer in the distance, a speck on the horizon. Not on the path, but approaching from the side, from within the field.
I am scared, but intrigued. Friend or foe? Someone coming to push me on this endless road? Thieves? MURDERERS??!
The form is approaching, and has a sort of iridescence, a twinkling, a glow.
Okay, I’m definitely dead.
It’s now an inch on the horizon, which means nothing without context… okay, more like a half inch if you pinch your finger and thumb together at arm’s length. I’m starting to panic, anxiety welling up in my stomach, thoughts of what the hell is going on here turning it in flips of the unknown.
The form is still approaching, and my muscles tense, ready to run.
But as the form comes closer, I become perplexed. There is something familiar here, as I start to see the gait, the quick steps.
It’s a woman.
I can definitely see now, and she’s approaching quite rapidly. Her gait is strong, yet relaxed.
Squared shoulders, back straight and tall, head high. Brave, intense, sharp gaze, long waves whipping in the wind. And she has this iridescent glow (no, not a vampire. Shut up, Stephanie Meyer.), a sort of other-worldliness. Her entire demeanor sets me at ease, my panic is calmed. I’m dead, this has to be a goddess of some sort. Or a princess, or wizard lady… or… or…
OH My God.
I know exactly who it is.
My own face gazes at me with compassion, and a broad. knowing, triumphant smile crinkles the corners of her eyes.
“Get up, Monica. You’re done with this.”
Worship Leader Gone Wild 