East Hastings.

When I look at the photo I took there, I smell that man's breath, and feel my heart race as suddenly suddenly his breath is on my cheek and his voice is in my ear and I'm awakened by his words.

We had walked out of Community, a vintage thrift store, in a sun shower.  The rain silently ended, and we stared in wonder down an alleyway to the brightest, biggest rainbow I have ever seen.  The sky at the end of the road was flooded in vibrant colour, washing over the garbage and power lines and drab.  My fingers fumble trying to find the right setting to capture the thick bands of light.

I can't see the rainbow in the picture.  The sky looks grey, the buildings look run down, the road looks plain.

But I'm standing there, the sun behind me, the rain in front of me, and the light dances on the raindrops and glorious, intense beams fill the air.  At some point I knew something about refraction and prisms and angles.

We keep walking, and soon find ourselves on East Hastings.  A man dumps a white grocery bag of cell phones onto the street, as a women explains the kind she needs. I feel my hand holding tightly clutching my purse.  I try to look at the ground after I catch myself searching for a face that seems "normal."  I judge so quickly.  I don't know the stories behind the sullen eyes and protruding cheek bones and unkept hair.  Who am I to say what is a normal face and a normal smell and a normal life?

I cling to my possessions, as if the poverty and brokenness around me is some kind of contagious disease threatening my life.  Here I am  in my fitted purple fitted coat that makes me feel like a sophisticated city girl, and my imported scarf wrapped just-so around my neck.  Here I am, my eyes painted with black liner and mascara - bright, and young, and lively, and beautiful.  Here I am, my hands doused in scented lotion - soft and gentle.  And even I know the words I'm dancing around.

(I'm picturing the part in the movie, Annie, where Mrs. Hannigan is preparing to bathe in gin.)

Oh yeah.  That's me, the one that claims to crave realness. See me over there, driving daddy's car, swiping my VISA and showing my friends the wonderful, homey, lovely West Coast?  And yeah, that's me and my shiny motivations to do shiny things and be a shiny person.  And I choke as my hypocrisy and flesh and sin slap me in the face.  Conviction cuts through the mud on my eyes and the junk in my mind and the noise in my ears, and I hear my footsteps again.  And I hear human beings - beautiful, beloved creation talking about the glorious rainbow I had just tried to capture in a photo.

This promise can't be kept in materialism.  It's not that kind of tangible.  But it's the kind that changes lives and heals the broken hearted and loves the poor.  And it's acted tangibly in genuine prayer, and genuine commitment to listen to and do the things that God whispers in my ear.

The sin in my life is as hurtful, is as dangerous, is as disgusting, is as horrible, is as much against the law as everything that I was judging.

And clean? Clean is not St. Ives face wash and Tide detergent and Bounce dryer sheets. Clean is recognizing the dirt that I sometimes drench myself in, and confessing it, and being washed by the blood of Christ, who took the punishment and paid the price for me. Clean is true, humble, honest repentance, turning from the darkness and walking in the light.

I didn't deserve that man's warning to put my camera away.  And in the drab of that photo, I see see the hopelessness of my sin.  And in the memory of that rainbow - I pray earnestly for East Hastings.  And I thank God earnestly for the gift of the Holy Spirit, opening my eyes to real brokenness.

My hand came up off my purse, and my eyes came up off the ground, and I experienced God on East Hastings.  God loving and working in lives in "Canada's Poorest Postal Code," and God loving and working my my own life.

An update...slightly jet-lagged.

I wonder if the emotions in airports are the same as they may have been at old train stations or sea ports in the past.   I picture the hugs and waves and tears and smiles.  I think of the excitement, fear, curiosity, adventure of going to a new place, or starting a new life, or going back to a place of memory.  Would the horns and steam engines, waves, or tracks have added something that can’t be found in airports? Would the smell of salt and seaweed or coal, or just a crowded place have made it different?  

I’m on a bumpy plane right now, 27 000 feet over British Columbia, 187 km away from landing in Victoria.  Every once and a while I hear the muffled laugh or murmur of my friends sitting five rows behind me.  I sit with quiet strangers, and it between bouts of sleep, I realize how much reality seems distant or unreal; dream like. 

While I may not be as outwardly excited by airplanes as someone else I know, they still amaze me.  How can I stand up, walk around, or sit in a hard seat on an object that is floating in the air? And it’s beautiful to stare out at the sky, and see Orion face to face with me, standing above city lights below.  

And if I put the whole idea of being in the sky out of my head, I still can’t believe I’m even “here.”  Here as in almost back on Vancouver Island.  Here as in almost in my hometown again.   I feel like I just got back to Ottawa!  And could it really be true that two of my closest friends are here with me?

The world gets smaller as bridges are built between the two  homes of my heart; old and new.  I’m nervous,  but so excited to be exploring the coast with Amber and Carla.  We have lots of ridiculous, ambitions plans.

 …The turbulance makes me think that the sky has rumbly tumblies in it’s belly, like Winnie the Pooh…