I Hope You Make It

‍ I have had to travel a significant amount for work recently.  I am not an easy traveler.  If nine out of ten restaurants are decent, I’ll pick the one that has bad food and lousy service.  This last week has been especially rough. I smashed my phone. Then, I lost my prescription sunglasses and forgot my computer phone charger at a VA facility in St. Louis.  They were sent to the other location after I had left there.  So, they had to be sent back to the first place - where I had originally left them.  If that wasn’t enough, I also left my hard hat and steel-toed boots in my hotel room one day.  Unfortunately, I will be returning to finish the St. Louis audit next week, so we’ll see how it goes.

Maxine Meixner’s poem, “I Hope You Make It” is what kept me going this week.  I know the first line is ironic with my religious audience, but I know we understand what she means.  I hope it can offer some comfort to you, like it does for me.  Her hope is my hope, which is also Peace Church’s hope.

I’m not religious,

But when I see someone running to catch the bus

I say a silent prayer for them.

I pray to no one and everyone

When I silently say

“I hope you make it.”

And these five words contain all the things I wish for this stranger.

I hope you make it.

I hope the stars align and you can be in the right place at the right time.

And once the fight to catch the bus is won

You can rest and catch your breath instead,

Knowing that you are exactly where you need to be.

I have all these little hopes for the strangers I see.

Like I hope you have the most perfect cup of tea,

And I hope that your mornings are slow,

And that you learn how to let go like the autumn leaves do,

In bursts of bright colour making way for something new.

I hope we all make it.  A link to Ms. Meixner performing the entire piece is here.

Dear One, help us to carry gentle hope for one another — for the stranger rushing to catch the bus, for the person beside us who is struggling in ways we cannot see, for those we love, and even for ourselves.

Teach us to hold one another in quiet prayer, to wish goodness, rest, and peace into each other’s lives. May we be people who say, in word and in spirit, “I hope you make it.”

Amen‍ ‍

Michelle is an Occupational Safety and Health Manager with the Department of Veterans Affairs. She’s a wife, mother, sister, and friend, a chocolate and coffee lover, reader of books, listener of podcasts, and a travel enthusiast.