Julie

On the way to Orlando International Airport in early June my friend Julie, who has never been to Europe, asked if I/we would be willing to send her a photo or two each day of our vacation, so that she, too, albeit vicariously, could enjoy the sights of the old continent.

I took her request as demand (in the noble kind of way) and have placed upon myself, to the best of my ability, to capture with my iPhone 6 camera what my eye could see, so my friend too could get a taste of delicious feast we were partaking in, not just for the eyes, but also for the soul and the spirit.

Little did I know that I was embarking upon truly an impossible endeavor of the most frustrating kind, and this wasn’t for the lack of my exceedingly earnest trying.

Day after day, I was sending the pictures of places, with each ‘send’ my heart growing more and more heavy, keenly aware how woefully inadequate those snippets were to portray what we were both seeing and experiencing.  It felt like I was sending my friend shriveled up potato peels while we were gorging ourselves on cloud-fluffy mashed potatoes doused in pork chop drippings gravy.

Each photo, on Julie’s end, was received with enthusiastic  ‘oooohs’  and ‘aaaaahs’, and genuine gratitude for the privilege of sharing in our experience.

This went on for several days, my frustration at my incapacity growing with each illustrated text.  I felt I was cheating my friend, offering her a poor, pathetic substitute for the real thing we were immersed in every moment of every day. Eventually the pain of this culminated into a revelation of sort.

If it was so difficult for me to describe the diverse glories of poppy fields in French countryside, the curious history of Mont-Saint-Michel, the crunch of the fresh baguette laden with Camembert, the nooks and crannies of old towns like London, Paris and Belgrade, how much more challenging would it be to portray the glories of the infinite God. No wonder our words and our pictures, even those most carefully chosen ones, lead to frustration and keen sense of inadequacy of those who make such attempts.

And yet, like my friend Julie, even a tiny glimpse of His manifest presence is bound to elicit the ‘oooohs’ and the ‘aaaahs’ and a deep sense of gratitude for the privilege of sharing in such delight.

I guess next time, there is nothing else to do but bring my friend along with earnest desire and prayer that she too can enjoy to the full the feast that only 'being there yourself' can procure.