Lost & Found

The first page was blank. Orelio closed the notebook, turning it around in his hands looking for a name he might have missed the first time. There was no name.

He looked around the bookstore. The magazine section where he stood was empty. It was one hour till closing on a rainy Monday night so the store in general was nearly empty. He turned to the second page where slanted waves of purple ink hung between lines like clothes drying in the breeze.

Hi God.

Do you know what I find interesting about you? The arbitrary nature of your goodness.

He closed the notebook again. This was a diary. A diary of a person writing to god. A diary whose fist sentence felt like an immediate intrusion upon the writer. He wanted to put it down, return it quietly behind the gardening magazine that had fist concealed it, but how could he? Here he had found a person questioning god in a way he never had, in a way that intrigued him.

He walked down the aisle glancing up at the security camera at the corner with concern. He decided that the best next step was to continue reading in order to learn the name of the writer before turning it into the store's lost & found.

At church they say, "God is good and that his mercies endureth forever." Where is this goodness they speak of? Could You describe it to me?

I don't mean to sound ungrateful. I recognize that I am healthy, my parents are alive, my sisters are alive, my nephews are alive. I have a good job, a nice apartment. I think Maslow would approve of the extent to which my needs have been met. Yes, indeed, they have been met and for that I am eternally grateful.

Yet I have an inkling that life might be more than just basic needs being met. Life has to also be about beauty. It has to be about love. Why else would You create flowers? Why give the universe color and form?

Yes, my body is healthy but what do you make of loneliness, of longing? Are they not ailments too; might they just not be painful enough for you to notice? Are the gurgling groans of an empty belly that much louder than the pounding echoes of a broken heart?

How deafening must my private sorrow be in order to find your ear?

This person was pissed. That is what Orelio considered as he stood staring out in front of him. How could someone who believed in god enough to quote the Bible and write letters to him speak to him this way. Did they not know that god could kill them instantly for such insubordination? Did they even care?

Again he convinced himself that he had to keep reading. This time arguing that the writer's signature was sure to be found at the end of the entry while simultaneously ignoring other perhaps faster solutions.

I have asked for a partner. I have waited for a husband. I have comprised, I have bargained, I have settled. I have lowered my value, misplaced my boundaries and yet, here I am again. Alone on a Friday night, nursing my frustrations as my friends detail the excitement of their romantic evenings.

A boyfriend? This girl was speaking to god in this manner over the need for a boyfriend? Orelio's brow furrowed as he considered the absurdity of such insolence. He disliked the writer almost instantly, formed an opinion so solid it gave form to an image. Beyond any doubt he saw a young, immature woman wanting to be wed rather than married. The type of woman his mother prayed against, the type of woman he did not want. With enough time he could find this her in the bookstore for he already knew how she looked and where she would be.

He headed straight for the wedding section looking for a white woman in her late twenties, very pretty, wearing cowboy boots and an attitude. A woman building up a fantasy she intended to make real.

But all three aisles of the wedding section were empty.

Is this Your goodness? To give life to a desire You did not intend to meet. Is this your goodness? To display the answers to my prayers in the lives of those nearest to me. Do You seek to taunt or torture? To insult or to shame?

I am upset. It is clear. I'll regret everything I have written. The wine in my loins will settle. The morning light will wash away my frustrations and I will welcome guilt with the familiarity of a sobering morning. So allow me to apologize now for what I will soon regret tomorrow.

Orelio's heart softened a bit. She recognized she was wrong. He now felt the writer had enough sense to pull herself back. Enough sense to ask for forgiveness. He headed straight to the religious section where he expected to find a young Black woman, early thirties, someone wearing flats with her hair parted down the middle in a low ponytail.

But both the English and Spanish sections of religious books were empty.

It is not my intention to insult or be ungrateful; as I am sure it is not Your intention to be silent, to be hurtful. I only ask these questions because failure to do so would make us a lie. It would make this whole thing we call a relationship a lie. Omission would convince me that You did not already know the inner workings of my heart, it would lure me towards the idea that I could possibly hide myself from You. If I know nothing else, I know that to be untrue. You see me.

I do not intend to hide myself from You. Do not hide Yourself from me, ever.

I have chosen to be candid, I am not ashamed of that, but I have valued honesty over temperance and for this I apologize.

With or without a husband, with or without my loneliness I know You will remain. I will continue these journals of written prayers to a God that is always listening even if never answering.

Thank you for your goodness, both the one I wish you had and the one I fail to see. Amen.

-Vanessa

Gregory stared at the name lost in thought until the letters blurred enough to require a blink. He reread certain sections of the page again and again, finding no issue in understanding the words though he could not manage the message.

His mother had spoon fed him religion long before she introduced peas and he found the writing to be disrespectful if not a bit blasphemous. This person had transformed their idea of prayer into a series of letters addressed to god as though they could be mailed. The concept seemed nonsensical but the message lingered with him. It was truthful, honest, transparent in a way he had never been with god...in a way he didn't think he could be.

He closed the notebook no longer desiring to return the journal. He read the second entry, the third, listened to the attendants repeatedly make the closing store announcements yet remaining fixed past the 30 minute, 15 minute, and 5 minute mark. He was lost in the pages, intrigued by the words of a stranger that lured him deeper within herself.

He took the journal home. Reading entry after entry of an unknown woman's most intimate thoughts. Throughout the night he grew ashamed of his actions, but this growing guilt did not deter him from turning to a new page time and again. Daybreak found him in this state and by morning he had read it in its entirety.

That same day he returned to the bookstore. Asked the teller if anyone had mentioned a journal. The teller buzzed a few of his colleagues but no one had so Orelio implied he had lost one rather than found one.

For the next year he carried the journal in his backpack wherever he would go. He even started one of his own. He felt a little silly writing "Hi God" atop his entries so he wrote back to Vanessa. Spent hours upon hours answering her questions, questioning her claims, agreeing with some of her stance but not before challenging her logic.

A second year passed and he began to read the books she casually mentioned in her writing, saw the movies she quoted, listened to the lyrics she had scribbled on the side of certain prayers with musical notes hanging all around them.

By the third year he tempered his obsession, reading the entries only on the days that Vanessa had actually written them, taking long pauses in between his readings just as she had done with her writings. Using her private thoughts as a type of daily devotional to keep him grateful, curious, or simply attuned to their corresponding rage.

His mother’s pressure finally burdened him enough to date a young lady he met on one of his work trips. He soon grew to like this woman. She was kind, smart, respectful; her name was Sharon, not Vanessa and this troubled his heart though he did not show it. He began to hide the journal when Sharon would visit, and shamed himself for rushing back to it the moment she left.

Like Vanessa he soon grew tired of god. No longer questioning the insolence she displayed in her first entry. He now understood. He too felt toyed with in a way that enraged him beyond measure. He kept Vanessa's journal, carrying it around no longer as a source of hope but rather as an anchor, tethering him to god's indifference.

Once rage had run its course he rekindled gratefulness, finding only the good in Sharon. Reshaping his mind to seek out the positive aspects of life when challenges came knocking. He regained a connection to god though never like the one he once remembered. He learned to temper his desires, to accept the bad that came his way as the transition needed for the good.

After a year of dating Sharon he decided to propose. Bought an empty journal with the question written on the second page, tied the best ring he could afford to a red ribbon and placed it inside as a bookmark. Boarded the last plane departing to her hometown on a rainy Monday night and sat next to a woman who pulled out a notebook mid flight and began to write.

The end.