Friday, April 14, 2006: In Atlanta, Georgia for a conference
I stroll my way to Atlanta’s Olympic park, about halfway down the road. I take a book and my CD player. The night’s warm/cool, and very pretty. Lots of locals are down there recreating. I’ve got Bach’s B Minor Mass on, mostly because it’s Good Friday, and I wanted to think about what that meant. I hardly ever do that.
As I listen very intently, and watch very intently, I notice the phenomenon that John Cage observed taking place before me. The music, because of the random operations of chance, or because everything connects, provides appropriate and sometimes electrifyingly parallel accompaniment to what I’m seeing. A strapping three year old runs with a football while his sisters, laughing, chase him. Two little brothers have their arms around each other, patting each other’s backs. A big family has a foot race. The music rises sweetly over these loving interactions. An old couple holds hands and talk with easy smiles. Someone who may sleep here at night lights a cigarette for a companion. I move around from bench to bench, from hill to shade, and see similar scenes enacted. Unbelievably, impossibly, there’s not a shadow or a harsh exchange, at least that I can see. The profound second chorus and the duet from the Gloria section, surely as beautiful a couple of creations as man can fashion, impress themselves upon me. God’s plenty, those for whom Christ died. I reflect gratefully on my own circumstances, and on my own bunch. I’m very moved.