Behind the Mic

“Check Check.”  (soft hum of mic feedback dwindling to silence, then sounds of breathing)  Stephanie squares off beind the mic.  The lights on stage blind the view ahead.  The room beyond is dark.  Alone, illuminated to God-knows-what, (she certainly cannot see anything or anyone) she performs her piece.  Tomorrow she will open the paper for her review.  She will turn to the entertainment section – or is it the religion section?  Could it be in politics?  She will blush, daring to think she may be covered in nation/world, and her vanity will carry possibilities of front page news.

I doubt if we know where our personal review will be.  If Shakespeare is on to something, if “all the world’s a stage,” the light shining in our eyes prevents us from seeing who is our audience.  So whom do we perform for?  Who is watching us act – for want of proper direction and grooming – the parts of ourselves?  And what on earth do we look like up there?

You may raise your hand, as I would: an eager sunday-school kid, ravenous for a gold star.  Oh, oh, I know!  God!  It’s God!  An answer both factual and theoretical as algebra.  And he looks like, well, whatever is beyond that curtain of light. 

 Okay.

I want out. I want off of this stage.  I want to descend the side stage steps, and grope along the wall until my eyes adjust.  I want to recognize who I’m looking for, five rows from the back.  There he is.  He’ll be looking for me too, I think.  I want to make my way back to his seat, and watch the show with him.  We’ll know each other like family.  God of the ancients will be sitting with me, familiar and stunning.  All the questions that once swallowed the world will be just a breath in the mic.  There is something about the recognition and comfort of love that confounds the most torturous question.