Water From a Rock

I live in New England, and this time of year it's frustrating because the temperature is gradually climbing but not nearly fast enough to make a tangible difference. There's no green grass, no daffodils, no robins, no sound of lawn mowers waking up from their slumber. In fact, it's worse than that. There are still patches of snow on the ground--dirty blotches on brown grass that serve as a cruel reminder of the winter just endured, and they sit there as if to say, "It's not really over, you know. We're still here. And you know what else? It could snow again. Even in April. Don't for a second think it might not."

There's more. This morning on my drive in to work I passed by a craggy rock formation on the side of the road and there were frozen chunks of ice stuck to the rock wall like gobs of glue or waterfalls frozen in time. The ice seems to flow out of the middle of the rock, and I like to pretend that there are little goblins inside the rocks pushing water out of any tiny opening they can find, and the water then transforms to ice when it hits the chilly air of night.

Yes, such scenes remind me that winter is still very much alive in New England, that any hope of the coming of spring must stay just that--a hope. I drive by my son's Little League field and see snow in the outfield and can't even envision a grounder slipping through the second baseman's legs and causing panic all around.

But the other thing I thought of when I saw the ice on the rock was Moses. Moses the unsure leader of that wandering band in the desert; Moses the one who went to God and said, "What am I to do with these people?" Moses who couldn't speak without stuttering. Moses who time after time dealt with quarrelling people and must have wondered what all this wandering was really for. And he does something remarkable: the people are thirsty and at God's command he takes his walking stick and hits a rock with it, and water comes gushing out.

So I see this water gush frozen in time on my way to work this morning in this desert called New England in March, and I realize that I need to have faith like Moses did. At various times I, too, wander in the desert. I, too, grumble and complain and test God. I, too, want to go back to Egypt where there's no economic downturn and housing is affordable and all the children play nicely with each other.

I need to have faith like Moses that spring is in fact just around the bend, that longer, warmer days are coming, that the lilacs will soon burst forth.

Not long after I saw those ice globs clinging to the rock today, I saw something else by the side of the road: crocuses. Small pinpricks barely visible to the naked eye--white, yellow, purple--peeking out to see if anyone's watching, ready to fight back against those bully patches of dirty snow.

Water from a rock indeed.