Lord Willing

When I went to bed last night, I thought I knew exactly how this morning would go. I was going to get up early, finish editing a short story I plan on submitting somewhere, and take my son to school. He had plans as well: up early to finish homework, then on to school.

Then tornado sirens jarred us awake at four o’clock in the morning, so we both slept later than we planned. I didn’t lay today’s clothes out last night, so in the rush I threw on a stained shirt and bleach-spotted yoga pants with frayed hems. Then he realized that something he needed for school was not where he thought it was and apparently not in the house. (In his defense, he had checked and been mistaken, so I couldn’t even lecture him–it’s the kind of mistake his mother makes all the time.) (Okay, I might have still lectured a little bit.)

I took my sloppily-dressed self and we made a quick trip to Walmart, getting him to school just after the bell. (The threat of his first tardy was less worrisome than the potential wrath of the later teacher.)

In other words, today has been a living object lesson for James 4:13-15:

Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and make a profit”—yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes. Instead you ought to say, “If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that.”

In hindsight, we could have done better this morning. We could have gotten up as planned. We could have done a better job last night getting ready for the day. I would not have hit the snooze button if I had known a trip to Walmart was in the works. I would have gone to bed earlier had I known tornado sirens would wake me up at four.

Each decision we made seemed sensible in light of the information we had. I thought I was dressing for a morning of housework. My son thought sleeping later would only cost him a bit of free time. It’s tempting in hindsight to say “shoulda, coulda, woulda,” but in this case, it wouldn’t have changed much. It was just a series of honest mistakes stacked on top of things we couldn’t predict.

And all of these things, so, so minor in light of the devastation just east of us. (Ten deaths. So tragic.)

And another reminder that we aren’t the ones calling the shots.

Update: A peek through my blog history tells me on March 1, 2011, I spent the wee hours of the morning under a tornado warning as well. I might want to write that on next year’s calendar.

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