A Track Before the Technology of the Train for the Terrain

I watched one of my classic, go-to-feel-new movies: Under the Tuscan Sun. Perhaps it was the beauty of Tuscan Italy, the meszmerizing Diane Lane, and the suave Italianos which had for all of these years distracted me from the actual storyline of the movie, which is a work in its own right.

A divorcee, a fixer-upper, a risk...a story that has met me in both romance and heartbreak. But today it struck a new chord in me. Francis was given the beautiful advice in the midst of her sadness to press on in hope and faith when her world was shattering, when she thought that moving on with her life in bold ways could be a mistake. A friend told her, "You know, in the Alps, they built a railroad track that was greatly needed long before a train was invented that could withstand the arduous journey. It isn't until the end of the movie, that all of Francis' wishes come true, just in a different way, as she realizes her prayers (though to random Catholic saints) were not in vain.

I feel that my life lately has been a lot of track building, on tough terrain well-before a train would meet the trestle. The past year or so has found me picking up my bags and moving to an obscure and at first unwelcome portion of the state, a sudden career change with school training at the place I had always dreamed of attending, budgeting and saving for God knows what (I mean that), and family planning without a husband anywhere NEAR on the horizon (a result of medical choices to go with the new-found disease), and I'm sure the list could go on and on.

Building a track is tough work, and it can mostly only be built with hope. Yet I find as Francis does, that the building, trusting, hoping gives her a new name, Franchesca, and will do the same for me. Slowly I find that as life goes on that as I just keep going, just keep praying, just keep hoping, that my dreams and wishes do indeed come true, just NEVER as I have imagined them. And for that, they are the more sweet. The handiwork of God, and not by me.