While dusting this morning, I
questioned my efforts, knowing full well that the dust would return. Why do we
dust that which only gets dusty again? Why do we make the bed every morning if
we are to mess it up again that night? Why do we love when we may get hurt? Why
do we give of ourselves when we may never receive? Why do we do our best if
only to sometimes fail? Why do we pray when our prayers seem to go unanswered? Why
do we live when inevitably, we all must die?
I remember a Spring Day recently, when my husband discovered baby
starlings in a nest in our wisteria vine upon the arbor above our front gate.
For the past week, we had been enjoying watching the starling parents build and
defend their nest in excited anticipation of the new arrivals. We admired Papa
Starling’s continual sentinel from our tree to our flag pole to the nest. My husband also helped fend off tenacious
Scrub Jays from threatening their nest. After climbing the ladder to take a
peak myself, my husband left the wisteria untrimmed over the nest and we went
about our chores with a lightened step.
As
he had done before when we heard the commotion, my husband came running with
broom in hand to help the Starlings fend off the bandits. The Starlings chased
Scrub Jay the perimeter of three front yard trees until he seemingly lost the
fight. Awhile later, I was shocked to witness Papa Scrub return to the nest and
carry off the young. Scrub Jay had killed the babies. Our help and their struggles seemed fruitless
and we mourned the loss of the baby starlings. Mama and Papa Starling cried and
squawked as they perched on our fence and their routine sentinel posts
throughout the day. Towards sunset, we noticed them returning to the nest with
twigs in their beaks. They began rebuilding their devastated home. We had not
only beheld the precious beauty of a young bird family nesting and living but
had seen first hand the annihilation of their home and young. Now, we perceived
life remaining.
The
river of life flows on. We build and sometimes are toppled. We love and our
hearts get broken. We give and do our best only to be forgotten or fail. Similarly,
sometimes the sick get sicker and the lost seem to disappear regardless of our
prayers. Despite our best efforts and no matter how
hard we fight death is inevitable. Are we absurd? Is God not listening? Why do
we carry on? Some do not; they give up. They lose hope and their spirit dies.
But, like the spider who persists no matter how many times its web is
destroyed… although the end result is the death of an insect caught in that
web…that life’s work brightens someone’s moment when they gaze upon its
intricate lacy beauty illuminated by light or glistening with dew drops.
Those tiny birds, whose lives were cut so
short despite the determined efforts of the parents and community, brightened a
moment no matter how brief. Likewise, it
is life which touches other lives. The end does not justify the means when that
final breath is breathed. Life is not voided in that moment of earthly and
bodily ending. Life remains and is measured by the lives brightened and
enriched because we did try and we did love and we did give and we did hope and
we did pray and we did live.
“Be strong and take heart, all you
who hope in the Lord.” Psalm 31:24