Читать книгу Unexpected Occasions of Grace - Mike Carotta - Страница 8

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Ever watch a person pray?

It is still dark out. I am on the treadmill at the health club early this morning, rehabbing my broken ankle. My ankle and I have not been on the same page ever since the doc put fifteen screws and two plates into it. I am walking so slowly that the machine tells me it will take me twenty-four hours to go a mile. I am staring down at my feet trying to get both of them to walk properly. My gait is so sloppy that I am flopping and bumping into the side of this slow-as-molasses-moving treadmill.

My ankle and I momentarily agree to play nice, so now I can return to saying my prayers, which is what I always try to do while working out at the health club. I have a lot to pray about. This turtle treadmill is facing the indoor track. In the midst of saying my prayers I look up. Then I notice.

A middle-aged woman is walking around the indoor track clutching a rosary in her right hand. I wait for her to come by again. Yep — yellow plastic rosary on white string with a white plastic cross. I wait for her to make another lap and come around again. Yep. I can see her lips moving. She is praying the Rosary while she walks.

My mind flashes back to my beloved father-in-law. Pop used to have one of these silver finger-type rosaries. It was like a ring you put on the index finger and you spun the thing around your finger slowly with each decade. A lot like me walking on this turtle treadmill.

The woman goes by me three or four more times. I am delighted each time I see her. Seeing someone praying always lifts my heart. Whether it’s the solitary soul kneeling in the pew before or after Mass, Israelis at the Wailing Wall, or Muslims kneeling East, it always raises my spirit, touches my soul, puts a bounce in my step. Lately, not so much the step thing …

I am aching to know more about her rosary. The whole yellow-and-white-plastic thing has sentimentality written all over it. My ankle announces that it is finished, so I limp off the machine. I see the woman now working on the stationary bike. And I go for it.

Slowly, and with a smile, I approach her. “It is good to see someone else praying while working out,” I say. She smiles back and nods.

“What’s the story with the rosary?”

“What’s that?” she asks.

“I saw your rosary and just knew there had to be a story with it.”

She smiles and nods reluctantly. I have knocked on the Story Door, and I can see that she is not sure she wants to open it. Then she does. “I am praying for my grandson. He’s seven and … and … he’s spoiled. Has a temper.”

She repeats it: “He’s seven. But … he’s spoiled … has to have his way. Spoiled is what I’m thinking.”

I was asking about the rosary itself, but when you knock on someone’s Story Door you never know who or what will step forward. I am embarrassed. I never intended to ask her what she was praying for.

“What about the rosary itself? I could tell it was special.”

“It is,” she said and nodded. “A few of us get together and make them. We made five thousand of them last year. Father takes them to Africa along with a bunch of other things. He says the rosaries go fast. Really popular among the people.”

“Geez. Five thousand!” I responded.

“I love the Rosary,” she said. “Funny thing. My niece had religion homework the other day, so she and her sister call me. They call me Aunt Nun. Aunt Nun and all. But I’m not really a nun. Anyway, they call me and say, we have just the perfect assignment you can help us with. It’s about the Rosary!”

Aunt Nun has a twinkle in her eye and a mischievous grin. “I had to go online! I didn’t know Joyful Mystery and Sorrowful Mystery. So I had to look it up! But I didn’t tell them I didn’t know.”

She laughed and shook her head. “What do I know about that?”

She kept talking as she headed toward another part of the health club. I stayed with her. Quietly and confidently she continued: “I love Mary. I really believe in the power of her intercession. I really believe she talks to Jesus for us.”

I smile at the paradox. Witness the way one knows how to pray deeply without knowing much about the specifics. This woman knows the Rosary. By heart.

I smile again and thank her: “I just got to say that it does my heart good to see someone else using workout time as prayer time. Thank you and take care.”

“You too. Got a session with the trainer right now.”

I turn and head toward the locker room happy that I had the courage to knock on the Story Door and blessed by the conversation that came forth. Then I notice. I have a bounce in my step. And it is Light.