Brokenness

Brokenness . Shattered Dreams. Trapped Mindset. These are not appropriate recurring thoughts this holiday season but they keep on coming back especially at work.

• I lost my voice for 2 days after Christmas.
• There’s a spiking throb in my right foot that is getting to be bothersome.
• There are the dreaded projects.
• The 320 GB desktop keeps on rebooting in cycle.
• The auto lock of the sedan has stopped fastening the locks.

I am a firm believer of the season of hope.

• The company doctor says "it’s viral." Your resistance is strong. At an instance, the spray and a mucolytic powder started to bring back my talking voice without any medication.
• The spiking pain would cease with the change of footwear.
• Associates pledge full support to keep projects going.
• Desktop and auto lock are now operational, in better conditions.

An uplifting moment on the day of Christmas is shopping for a hosted lunch at home. At the last minute, I decided to add additional fares and beverages to the set menu. Supermarkets which had operations that day open only at noon time leaving little time for preparation.

Shopwise in Araneta Center however opened an hour before the announced schedule which I accidentally spotted while at the parking lot. Shopper's traffic was light unlike the chaotic condition a day before as captured by the news coverage on TV. A seafood staff attended to my requests from selection to packing and weighing. As a walk in shopper, he would not even allow me to touch the crabs and the shrimps until he secured a cart for convenience.  Seafood and beverages were prepared ahead of the guests’ arrival. Their additional to the fare was surprisingly much appreciated as they were rated as fresh, sweet and “meaty.” Story on how they landed on the table for the feast was never disclosed until now.

I recall one Easter Sunday where Fr. Danny Huang, a Jesuit made a homily at the Cenacle Convert many years ago. I paraphrase, “Man is broken. It is inevitable as he committed sin and separated himself from God. Yet on Easter Sunday, the chance of redemption was completed which started from His birth on Christmas day."

Broken things get fixed in due time. Shattered dreams can be reconstructed. Trapped mindset is work in progress.

For the coming new year full of hopes and aspirations, Sacred space reminds me of the 1 January message, “I exist in a web of relationships - links to nature, people, God. I trace out these links, giving thanks for the life that flows through them. Some links are twisted or broken: I may feel regret, anger, disappointment. I pray for the gift of acceptance and forgiveness.”