Wednesday 22 April 2015

Down the Line

One of our number was delayed yesterday enroute from England to Scotland to participate in a Continuing Education Event by an incident on the Railway Line.
I found it difficult to embark on the Conference until I'd taken some time to reflect on/pray about this:

Sitting on the train
On a journey
Destination determined
Perhaps musing on events before the journey started
Or anticipating what is to come
An announcement is made:
"There's been a fatality on the line."
Inconvenient - to say the least.
Inconvenient for me
delaying my arrival 
Inconvenient for those with whom I am meeting
pushing back the start of a carefully planned programme
Inconvenient for train crews
those on either side of "the blockage"
Inconvenient for those whose task it is to schedule
arrivals and departures
and rolling stock
being in the right place
at the right time.
But much more than inconvenient
for family members
whose loved one has died
and who will never know
why that was the time and place and method chosen.
Much more than inconvenient for a community
saddened and shocked as the news travels through.
Much more than inconvenient for emergency crews
responding to a call
and becoming embroiled in trauma.
Way down the line
the effects roll out 
connections are made
and humanity
knows itself embroiled
in the drama of life
united in fragility
and vulnerability
and in being mortal.

1 comment:

  1. Thanks for this Liz. The ripples of a death from suicide are huge. The family, the recovery people, the community.
    Currently wondering how to help a community deal with second such death in less than two years but who have not had a funeral to attend as both families wanted that done privately. Ripples......

    ReplyDelete

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