The Things We Carry

As often happens when I find myself on an overcrowded Max ride into the city, I seek out some mental breathing room. As I considered the ridiculous weight of my bag on my back I began to think about the things we carry. While I pondered that idea, a short story came to mind that I had read years ago. The story followed a group of soldiers into the jungles of Vietnam, while one by one, they opened their bags.

Each precious piece of their history was carefully unwrapped and laid bare, with hungry study of each fold of the paper, a deep inhale of the perfumed envelope, or lingering exploration of the silken softness of a pair of stockings. Each element tasted, smelled, and fondled like a talisman. Each one holding fast to a fragment of what was their past life. That last remnant of another world would be the lifeline to the unraveling thread of memory.

How like them I am. Lingering over my past, with smell and touch, wrapping its decaying shreds about me like a protective covering. Hoping that clinging to that which has come before will give me some comfort, some spark of illumination for the mist covered road ahead of me. I can look at my past logically and say, that is not where I want to be again, and yet, it still whispers to me. Like a burial shroud it can wrap my mind in fear and death.

Gently and carefully the Great Comforter, the Compassionate One, is removing this second skin we beg Him not to take from us. He washes us with tenderness as He knows our wounds have wept into its folds and bonded with this Fear in an unholy union. Each of us carries the markings of life on our bodies, our minds, our hearts, our souls. These whisperings are as soft and silky as a pair of stockings and yet cling to the weeping wound, covering the festering flesh. Christ kneels before us, carrying his simple bowl of water. We tremble with a mix of longing to be free of the rotten flesh and a dread of what is to come. With a steady gaze in our eyes he moves closer to us, dipping his cloth to begin the circular motions of cleansing.

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So he got up from the table, took off his robe, wrapped a towel around his waist,  and poured water into a basin. Then he began to wash the disciples’ feet, drying them with the towel he had around him.

  When Jesus came to Simon Peter, Peter said to him, “Lord, are you going to wash my feet?”

Jesus replied,

“You don’t understand now what I am doing, but someday you will.”

“No,” Peter protested, “you will never ever wash my feet!”

Jesus replied,

“Unless I wash you, you won’t belong to me.”

Simon Peter exclaimed, “Then wash my hands and head as well, Lord, not just my feet!”