I marvel at those who can quickly end relationships, moving on, never looking back and not really caring about someone who was once significant. In fact, I've come to believe that this is most people.
But it's not me.
I think the moment you meet someone, you cannot be unchanged. Both the significant ones and the inconsequential leave something of themselves as part of who I am.
Once I was driving down Bay Street in downtown Savannah, Georgia on a beautiful spring day. The sky was blue, it was warm and pleasant and everything was in bloom. The windows were rolled down and I was taking my sweet time getting to wherever I was going determined to enjoy such an incredible day.
For no reason whatsoever I glanced over to the car heading in the opposite direction and saw her. Long brown hair hung forward as she slumped over the steering wheel, forehead resting on it. She held her head up and was sobbing, tearing gushing from her eyes and pouring down her freckled face. Her mouth was open and though I could not hear the crying, I could feel it. Our eyes met for the briefest of seconds and then she was gone.
Though it happened twenty years ago, she is part of me now.
Sometimes when I'm sad, or empathetic to others going through hard times, she comes to me just as alive and hurting as she was then. I can still see her. I can still feel her.
So when I saw the Prodigal Father yesterday as he exited and I entered the Chick-fill-A on Victory Drive in Savannah, I was unprepared for the moment.
He was too.
"Micheal Elliott," he called me by name as if to remind him that I still exist. I called him by name in return and the most awkward of silences filled the moments that slowed to a crawl.
"Take care Herb," I finally said moving forward.
"Yeah. You too Micheal," he replied passing me by.
And our lives go on.
Though I know deep inside of me that the Prodigal Father will never come home again.
