The Longest Saturday

9 a.m. rolled out of the western sky on Good Friday and reminded us all what it was like on that ancient day. The sky darkened and furled its brow, lightning cackled back and forth and a gale caught up the torrents of rain and tossed them sideways. The earth itself remembered the death of its maker as twisters sauntered around the southeast. And then, there came Saturday.

The long day, when those few huddled behind locked doors and their world – our world – stood at a dead and apathetic calm. Too fearful and too shocked to venture forth, I can only guess at their stunted conversations and waxen stares. The weather seemed to oblige us again today, with clouds gazing ambivalently from a directionless sky. The sun has occasionally snuck a peek from his high castle keep before hiding again. The world both hangs in wait and buzzes onward with its forgetful motion. How it must have seemed then. Rome went about its business. The Pharisees remembered their Sabbath, mostly in the pompous manner they had kept with for so long. Ships came and went at Tarshish. Pagan merchants caravanned across the Negev. But a few dour faces in Jerusalem waited in the dark doldrums of their grief.

Across town now, the mall drones with activity. The interstate is a whirlwind of trucks and travelers dodging the glaring orange barrels. People buy and sell, eat and drink. But some deep part of all creation still waits for tomorrow.