Delayed

South Carolina rain pelted my van's windshield. I watched through wipers and partial darkness as an on-coming bus slowed to a stop. As it turns out, the wipers were not what ended up clarifying my vision that day.

The stop sign on the side of the school bus extended slowly outward as I sighed with frustration. My quest to get my child to school on time was delayed. "I might have to take him into the school myself," I thought, "and trapse through the rain." It seemed to be taking this bus an inordinate amount of time to get moving again.

That's when I saw her. Around the side of the bus, a middle-aged woman (probably a mother or grandmother), barely clad against the cold and rain, was holding an umbrella as high as she could above a child in a wheelchair. The child needed to get onto the bus.

Each step of the mechanized process that would lift this child onto the school bus was suspended so that I could see. The woman very carefully stood on her toes and made sure the rain never touched the precious child as he was being lifted. I noticed the passion with which she guarded him from the rain, not even seeming to notice that she was getting drenched. When her child was completely safe on the bus, she turned and walked back into her house.

I was mildly ashamed of my impatience, but realized my heart had changed with the changing scene in front of my eyes that day. I wasn't cold anymore, and the ride to school ahead didn't seem so difficult. The sheltering umbrella had been a beacon--a reminder for me to focus on love, and to willingly guard moment-to-moment priorities. That picture of woman and child will forever be with me, and I hope that I am a better human being because of it.