and see in it.
And if you ever share one of these stories with someone else, invite them do the same.
There are reflective questions at the end of the book for those who find it helpful.
Above all, it is hoped that some of these encounters will help you recall, capture, and live with your own unexpected occasions of grace.
That is all that matters
The mystics of old tried to tell us that the ordinary is holy and the present is sacred. And the One called us to have ears to hear and eyes to see.
From Where grace comes.
1
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.
2
A generous gesture can be grace enough
Whenever I fly into a city for work, I try to ride the city bus from the airport to the hotel. Public transportation keeps you in touch with the working class, the locals, and whoever else is trying to get to work, the grocery store, or the clinic.
My favorite bus is the one that runs from the New Orleans airport to downtown and costs a buck and half. People riding public transportation don’t see color. Don’t see status. Don’t see strangers. And they don’t talk much. Except the lady who sat in front of me one Sunday afternoon. She carried two plastic shopping bags, maybe three. And she talked freely, loudly, and to everyone, especially to the lady behind me. So here I am literally in the middle of two people talking past me.
The woman in front of me tells the woman in back of me that she forgot it was Sunday, therefore the buses didn’t travel as frequently as weekdays and her boyfriend was waiting for her. She was almost an hour late. She said her boyfriend offered to just call her a cab, but she refused.
“Hundred bucks for a cab! I told him. Are you crazy?”
“Hundred bucks? Really?” asks the woman behind me.
“Naw. More like twenty-five bucks, but still,” she confessed before changing the channel.
“I love your jacket! Is that down? Must be warm on a crazy cold day like today? Where’d you get it?”
“Burlington Coat Factory,” says the lady behind me. “Everything was like 70 percent off. Serious! Seventy percent off!
“I love your gloves too. Where’d ya’ get ’em?”
The lady behind me hesitated, said she couldn’t remember. Looking out the window, trying to be invisible, I’m thinking she didn’t want to say.
The lady in front of me owned the remote to the conversation and changed the channel again. “Yesterday, I saw a bus driver get out of the bus and chase after a guy who dropped a hundreddollar bill out of his pocket on the bus. He ran after the guy just to give him back his money. Made me a believer again. Made me a believer in people. Good people. A hundred-dollar bill!”
“Good deeds come back to you,” says the lady behind me. “Always comes back to you. Always.”
Short silence followed. I noticed it.
“I found