Connections

We forget so easily that we are all connected. When I was driving out with Eric to Colorado for this internship we were traveling alongside the Lewis and Clark expedition trail, a road traversed by Lewis and Clark (ha) and also so many other people in the history of our country. In the history of the world. We walk the same ground now as the Native Americans who lived here way before us and the pioneers to ventured out into the unknown and so many people with so many stories and so many pasts and futures. It took Eric and I 21 hours to drive from Columbus to Colorado Springs. In a car. Can you imagine that trip 100 years ago? People died and were born and lived the whole of their existence on the land that we still walk on.
In that same fashion, how do we forget that the land that we are on right now is the same land that is being fought on in Israel or that is being stolen from women in the DRC or that is welcoming the sun in the Himalayas? When we talk about all being on “one Earth” it’s so easy to forget that means we are all touching each other. It’s the same land. We are connected to everyone in this world by the same land.
I think we forget this, this connectedness and intimacy, because of how often we cut up the Earth. To get to a place quickly, we fly. This creates two separate universes, the one before the plane and the one after. Instead of seeing the gradual changes of our one planet over long journey (therefore reminded us of our connection), we see two drastic places that bear no resemblance to each other. No wonder moving to a new place proves to be so isolating. No wonder we feel so apart. We don’t let ourselves see that we are together.
Overall, we are connected vertically, through the existence of so many lives in the past and so many lives that are coming in the future on whatever square foot of land you may choose to examine. We are connected horizontally by the two touch points-my feet to the ground then the ground then the feet of any other person in this entire world. We are all connected. And God means for us to be family.
So the one constant here is the land, the Earth; this place. While we may not see the people before us or the people on the other side of the world, it does. It will. And I think, as my friend Ela told me the other day, when you spend a lot of time with the land, you start to feel that heartbeat. The heartbeat of all of the life it has experienced and will continue to do so. When God spoke the world into existence, it was the same word that spoke Adam and Eve. As much as God places Himself in us, He placed Himself in this place.
I’m mad at myself that I’ve missed this. The heartbeat. By being too busy and distracted. Maybe this is what God means when He asks us to “Be still and know that I am God.” Maybe when I am finally still I will be able to hear, to feel that heartbeat. Because it’s there. It’s beautiful and it’s there.
The heartbeat of life. We’re all connected.

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