When the ice Gets Thin

 

We live amid surfaces and the true art of life is to skate well on them

Emerson

When I was about twelve, I got my first pair of ice skates. 

We lived in New Jersey which is not exactly the center of the skating world,

 but there was an IceOrama or something like that at the mall 

and my parents signed me up for lessons. 

I loved it.

I loved the cute little skirts and the swish of the skates.

I loved the grace and the power of the skaters.

There was only one problem.

I could not skate and I could not seem to learn.

I would watch kids much younger than myself 

do figure 8’ s 

and pirouettes.

I would usually watch this from a sitting position either on the bench or on the ice-

 as I seemed to have fallen quite a bit.

It occurred to me years later that it was neither the skates nor my inexperience that held me back.

I just did not trust the ice.

 I was moving on a surface as alien as the moon

 and I was so unsure of it that I never connected.

                                                           Life can still be that way

.                                                               The ice seems thin

                                        …the rough spot seem frequent

…and there are dangerous bits of black economic and emotional ice where it is the least expeced

But this time, I am ready.

I am lacing up my skates

 and I will take the ice as it comes.

 and that's poetiquejustis

My brothers and sisters, consider it nothing but joy when you fall into all sorts of trials, because you know that the testing of your faith produces endurance. James 1:2-4