Trying to catch the bus

It’s a mad rush every morning.

Whether we wake up early or late, those last minutes before the school bus arrives bring a flurry of activity. The bus stop is right across the street from our house—thank goodness—but that doesn’t mean getting there is easy. Every day there’s a scramble to grab lunch boxes, water bottles, coats, masks, backpacks—and “Wait! Do you have band today? Where’s the trumpet?”—as our boys hurry out the door.

We’ve never missed the bus, but we’ve come close.

Earlier this week, it snowed a little, and I wasn’t sure the bus was going to come. I had given up on it when the bus came rumbling down our street. Our boys lunged for their backpacks and everything else and raced out the door, running down our snowy front lawn in their sneakers.

“Did Ms. Roberta have to wait for you?” I asked them that evening.

“She had already closed the doors when we got there,” one of them told me. I imagined them running up to the door as it shut and catching the driver’s attention before she pulled away.

Terrifying. Thrilling. It was a close call, but they made it.

I’ll admit that I was a little bit proud.

Every now and then, we have a morning where we are ahead of schedule, where I’m not calling out the time every two minutes, where I’m not scrambling to fill thermoses while people brush their teeth and comb their hair. On those mornings, when we are doing just fine, I often let down my guard and lose track of time. So, we still end up rushing out the door as the bus is arriving.

But we pull it off. We catch that bus. And, with that one exception, we haven’t kept our driver waiting—yet.

With Lent approaching, I’ve been thinking that it might be nice to think ahead and prepare a bit for that journey toward Easter. A little preparation now can enrich that time. But whether we take time to prepare or find ourselves running up toward Ash Wednesday at breakneck speed, God will be waiting for us—doors and arms wide open, ready to walk with us toward Easter.

No backpack needed.

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