A Beautiful Tenor

I sound like a pedantic annoyance ordering a decaf soya latté at one of my favourite beach cafés, where almost no one recognises me a year later. But I’m looking after my health, whilst still cupping the coffee in my hand as I wander out the door bidding the ladies a “good afternoon!”

I stretch my limbs across the road quickly as if prancing to escape the chill of the shade cast by the modern city scape behind me, and wiggle on down past the green hill to the beach. Sitting upon the concrete steps, I pray.

As I silently mingle words and thoughts together to my God, I feel the city dance around me. The shadow of a bicycle echoes across my back as the sojourner upon it rides by. There is a tickle of cool shade that accompanies it, and the sun quickly returns. I imagine the place were the people I have grown to know in my time abroad here with me. 

My eyes turn to the volleyball nets strung across the sand. Where surfers and old men in speedos dabble in some beach football, I replace them now with my people. My beloved friends that delight in so much joy and goodness when we find ourselves in one another’s company. The echo of a familiar sound pierces the silence of my day dream, though still a part of it. What Lorrie Moore beautifully describes as a laugh “…smooth, beautiful and tenor, making you feel warm inside of your bones. And it hits you…”  

I see the dark outline of the laugh’s owner turn around to smile at me. The sand in the late afternoon sun looks like unsettled dust dancing around his feet, a gentle bear-like posture and a relaxed stance as he comes to a holt. There’s the promise of peace in his heart. God’s mercy and deliverance written on the softened lines of his face. 

To say I want my two worlds to collide is an understatement.

To be there or to see you here would be a beautiful gift of God. 

All of you.