Walking Each Other Home — Joanna Seibert

Walking each other home

“Find those who tell you, Do not be afraid, yet stay close enough to tremble with you. This is love.”—Cole Arthur Riley, This Here Flesh, p. 90.

I have most often described courage as “fear that has said its prayers.” Many may recognize this as a 12-step recovery saying.

Cole Riley deepens our understanding of fear. He tells us that fear is not something we need to face alone. We are to live in community with friends who understand our worries and may even share them. Friends walk with us through fear. Neither of us knows what will happen, but their presence, not their words, makes all the difference. This, indeed, is love.

We sit with those who are sick and afraid to die. We stand with each other when no one else will.

I see the image of Dr. Joycelyn Elders, when she was the Surgeon General, holding her young son’s hand as she walked with him to court when he was accused of drug use. That was love.

I see parents and friends sitting at the bedside of a child who was severely injured in a car accident.

I see men and women in Ukraine standing together to resist an invasion of their country, even though they were shopkeepers and teachers just a few months earlier.

I see members of a town devastated by a hurricane, flood, or tornado holding each other up and picking up the pieces together.

I see young men and women in the military, protecting our country in wars they did not start, who went to proms and graduations just months earlier.

Today, we give thanks for all those known and unknown who have done this for all we love.

Joanna. https://www.joannaseibert.com/