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What we have here
is a failure to communicate...
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I was driving through Texas.
Well, not driving through Texas.
No one drives through Texas.
Texas is far too expansive to actually drive from one side to the other.
Texas is much like the breadth of Asia's Gobi Desert.
No one is actually sure if it's ever been traversed.
I was actually driving from my home in Louisiana to the Dallas Metroplex. As I traveled, I felt compelled to call a treasured friend.
For some time, he'd been grieving the loss of two young adult children. They tragically died within months of each other. Grateful for the hunch, I found my friend to be in a dark place, overshadowed by grief.
We talked.
Of life and death, of body and soul,
of grief and recovery, of trust and uncertainty.
We talked.
Of such expansive themes...
in short snippets between
dropped calls. We talked.
But became increasingly frustrated
by our inability to communicate.
I was grieved by my friend's grief and by our inability to finish a conversation. My words between calls, I'm embarrassed to say, bounced from prayer to profanity as I struggled to maintain connection with my friend.
It was following the eighth dropped call--yes, eight; I'm a slow learner--that I laughed at my failure to appreciate the irony of the moment. I found a town I was reasonably confident would have a cell tower. I called my friend one more time...
"Do you understand what's happening
between you and me?" I asked of my friend.
"We're in two different states. We're both fine.
We're simply grieved
by our inability to communicate with each other."
So...
"Do you understand what's happening
between you and your sons?" I ventured.
"You and your sons are in two different states. You're each fine.
You're simply grieved
by your inability to communicate with each other."
I can be so slow...
a s s l o w a s a t r i p a c r o s s T e x a s.
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