An interesting thing about the sidewalks in Buenos Aires is that, oftentimes, they are tiled. Yes, as in tile that we Americans would put in our bathrooms or kitchens. The majority of the tile (at least in my neighborhood) was high gloss. More times than not, I would have to walk incredibly fast across that tile to reach any given destination because, in pure Amanda fashion, I was running late (further explained in Seven and Thirty-nine).
My last-minute nature became especially problematic on rainy days. It turns out that high gloss tile gets incredibly slippery when wet, which is not best combined with rushing feet. Countless times, I slid into people, storefronts, or puddles. I am fully confident that no one who witnessed my rainy day rush would have ever described me as graceful; silently frantic would probably have been more accurate. Frantic because, well, my thoroughfare was essentially a Slip-N-Slide and I was in a rush, and silent because there was no reason to say anything. My words wouldn’t stop the rain, nor would they change the material underneath my feet, nor turn back the clock. Neither would they remove any of the always-present obstacles along my route: the contents of the sheer pandemonium. I still had to navigate that.
Despite not living in the capital city of Argentina, having a vehicle to get me to where I need to go, and being fifteen years older, the path I take is still littered with chaos and, at times, brings less than pleasurable things that cause me to lose my footing a bit. While I would still classify myself as frantic when rushing and silent when my voice won’t change anything, there is one thing that is different about who I am today than who I was then: Jesus. It is because of Him that I continue forth even after I lose my footing. It is because of Him that I can (most of the time) focus on my destination instead of what the path looks like.
It is because of Him that I walk in unmatchable peace in the midst of sheer pandemonium.