The Vortex

It’s early in the morning when she pulls up. Already, her heart is racing as she walks into the swirl: of emotions, smells, noises and colors that makes up the Vortex. Yes, she’s shaking as she is totally absorbed into a cornucopia of feelings: fear, joy, torment, struggle, hope, despair. Why she is here and what she is doing escapes her consciousness for a moment. Her doubts well up within her. A surging crowd of humanity overwhelms her. People of all shapes, sizes and colors fly before her. She feels like she is falling, falling from the sky with no parachute. She feels like she is drowning, drowning in an ocean of possibilities and can’t go up for air. She struggles and waves her arms. She feels a footing as she mounts the stairs. Yes, she can do this.

But then, depression and insecurity again attacks her and she veers off course again. She takes a deep breath. All the great and ephemeral dreams and aspirations of mankind lie before her; all the misery and joy of the human spirit stretches out as far as she could see.

Yes, she has entered the Vortex and she feels the hair rise on the back of her neck. What lies ahead today? Will she feel up to it? Will she be able to do what she needs to do?

A room is before her and she looks over the large courtyard. She sees the sun rise on a new day. She marches in and put up her stuff quickly, decisively.  They all sit before her distracted. Disjointed. Dispossessed. Disconnected. She has a flashback to another time. Memories come rushing in; the troubled and frustrated disappointments of yesterday and its turmoil. Happier moments; laughter. Those events of many years ago, all resigned to memory like faded jeans.

For all of us pass through it. That journey. That passage of life. A spinning tunnel of dreams; that sifter of desires, that tumult of hope. Pulling us through and over and into the next dimension. And we hold on the best we can, struggling, confused, sometimes reaching up a hand for God to catch and sometimes sinking down, down, then letting go. Hunting for solid ground and seldom finding it; slipping in the muck, soaring into the heavens, searching for clues; clueless at times. Finding guidance and direction and balance, finding peace within.

And it all starts in the Vortex. Welcome to the Vortex, the Matrix of life. Welcome to the high school.

The second bell rings. It was the first five minutes.