Fallen, Nevada
Psalm 121:
1 I will raise my eyes to the mountains;
From where will my help come?
2 My help comes from the LORD,
Who made heaven and earth.
3 He will not allow your foot to slip;
He who watches over you will not slumber.
4 Behold, He who watches over Israel
Will neither slumber nor sleep.
5 The LORD is your protector;
The LORD is your shade on your right hand.
6 The sun will not beat down on you by day,
Nor the moon by night.
7 The LORD will protect you from all evil;
He will keep your soul.
8 The LORD will guard your going out and your coming in
From this time and forever.
— NASB
One of the wonders I appreciated about the desert were the mountains in
the distance. They were always there beckoning me onward. There may be
sandy terrain, low brush, gullies, and cacti in three directions, but there
were snow-capped mountains looming on the horizon.
That is what I loved about the desert. No matter how long the road or
monotonous the terrain, the horizon held the mountains which made my
eyes look toward heaven. Regardless of the heat, the white-topped
mountains made the desert dweller remember the coolness of the snow
and could transport the traveler to another time and place. A citizen of the
desert knows that they mostly live in the reality of the heat, the lack of
water, and the prospect of danger, but they live with possibilities of an
otherness. The mountains in a distance provided Hope.
That was very different from the prairies and the plains. There was nothing
there to capture your eye or hem in your dreams and possibilities. The
prairies were hard on the settlers of the 1800’s. Most had left family and
community behind and moved out onto the plains, miles from anyone else
and even the closest railways. The work was hard; their houses were small
and dark; the weather was harsh. The wind had nothing to break its sound
or its constant ability to wear away everything in its path, be it living or
land. As far as the eye could see, there was nothing to break the view or the
despair and a sense of isolation.
This experience was so devastating it had a name, Prairie Madness. It was
not a diagnosable, medical term, but it was a condition known to the
people who lived there. It was said to affect both men, and women, but as
is so often the case, women internalized the pain and loneliness as
depression, while the men frequently manifested their isolation in anger
and violence. I remember the first time I got out of my car to get gas in
Kansas on a hot summer afternoon years ago. I was immediately assailed
with hot wind and a relentless whistling sound. That brief experience
reminded me of the stories of Willa Cather and Larry McMurtry and the
hardship of living on the prairie.
According to literature, the only real cure for Prairie Madness was to
move, to seek community, and/or to find some way to refocus the
isolation. The twentieth century brought some relief for the prairie
dweller, with new ways to communicate and travel, but isolation still
plagued them then, as it does us today. The twenty-first century has
provided us with even more ways to communicate, while separated, with
multiple electronic devices and computer platforms. We Zoom, Facebook
Live, share our brief stories on Instagram and use multiple other apps to
communicate. However, the ironic phrase,
” let’s stay in touch”
, actually
lacks touch, eye contact and shared space.
After this year of isolation and fear, we need Hope and Horizons. We need
community and each other. We need a long view that replaces the
smallness of our homes and the trepidation that accompanied every
journey beyond those walls. When it is safe, let us not languish in our
isolation. Ironically, our Prairie madness has more to do with our smallness than the vastness of the desert and plains, but it has been no less
devestating. We need to go outside (with all of the precautions needed),
wave to our neighbors and seek a horizon to take our dreams outside of
the walls that have limited us for this season. Then lift our eyes to the
horizons with the full assurance that the Lord will protect us; He will keep
our souls. and guard our going out and your coming in; from this time and
forever.
Prayer:
Thank you God for new perspectives, new horizons and for new
opportunities. Give us the power and the grace to move when moving is
what will save us. Amen