These six months have brought me back to the beginning in many ways. The sun has thrown off the blankets and drowsiness of winter, shining as a generous friend once again. The trees stand full and green and proud. Like every year in the beginning of May, it is Tulip Time in Holland. The tulips, however, confused by a bipolar winter, were a bit too eager for spring. They bloomed full-force a week and a half before the festivities, leaving Holland's favorite floral celebration a bit naked. But the spirit remains. Venders still sell the fatted-fat to patrons decked out in various degrees of Dutchiness. Eighth street stands closed to traffic, transforming downtown into a long open market. Elderly couples, skateboarding high-schoolers, and baby-strolling soccer-moms roam the pavement with impunity. Occasionally the masses part to allow processions of dutch dancers and street-sweeps, well-to-dos in sports cars, countless marching bands, and various rolling floats, everything from a giant duplo house to a mobile, human-propelled bar from the Brewery. Everywhere there is the CLONK of wood-shod feet. A lone balloon floats away into a flawless blue sky to the dismay of an unknown child. It is all so familiar. Just the day before we sat in the apartment window above what used to be Treehouse Bookstore; we watched the parade with our feet dangling out the sill, just as we had a year before.
As I sit on the curb watching and thinking over all of this, I am struck by a sense of timelessness. I wonder how much this festival has changed over the years, if the reasons for celebrating remain the same. Perhaps it doesn't matter. Perhaps Tulip Time is a manifestation of a hidden need, a need for some things to simply remain in a world that is increasingly mobile and amorphous, one that calls for compromise and cost-effectiveness.
I am a fresh graduate; I feel that need. These last six months have seen the end of many things, some that began four years ago when I first set foot on Hope's campus, and some that had just been coming into the light. Whether in newfound affections or in the steady beat of the well-worn rhythms, joy has filled these months. Yet with that joy there has been the knowledge of what's to come. Every song sung, every message heard, every moment shared and adventure dared has had a pinch of that knowledge laced within it. On the evening of May 6th we raised our glasses, lit up our sparklers, said our farewells, and drank in every last moment we could, sweetness with a hint of bitters.
I was ready to give up some of these moments, but others I was not. Some of them I wanted to remain, to be timeless. Sometimes the tulip blooms when you don't expect, and though you rejoice at its blooming, it is too soon for the festivities to begin. You might pluck it, put it in a vase and set it on the dining room table where it is easy to marvel at its beauty, but flowers don't grow in water and glass. You might will and hope and pray for it to remain long enough for the parade, but it is going to wilt. Hold too long and it will rot, the beauty you might have hoped for long gone. My table is not without its vases.
At my core I am a diehard. A special brand of stubbornness runs in the Pedigo blood. I long to see things persevere; I would see them last for the goodness that I see in them. When I truly care about something I will fight for it tooth and nail. Nothing grieves me more than to see goodness fade or die when it seems there might be more life ahead of it. In those moments I feel like a failure. It is a hard lesson for me, and I am learning oh so slowly, that these things we are given in life, these flowers that bloom, they do not grow or remain of our own volition. We may plant the bulbs and tend the soil, but we cannot will the stems to grow or the petals to open. When they do, we can rejoice at the gifts they are. When they die we may grieve at the loss, but in the end all we can do is wait, plant the bulbs, and tend the soil. Perhaps flowers will bloom again with the bulbs already planted; perhaps not. Perhaps new bulbs will yield greater beauty of their own, but our hope is not in flowers.
Our hope lies in what is timeless, islands of rock in a relentless tide, a steady diet of faithfulness and goodness. Dining rooms are for dining. If we sit long enough, we might smell good things being prepared in the kitchen. The tulips may bloom early, but we still celebrate Tulip Time. We still don our wooden shoes and buy our fat balls. We hope in such things because they remain. They are beyond our influence. They simply are. The wind passes over the flowers and they are gone; their place knows them no more, but our hope is in the everlasting, in the God who remains and whose kingdom rules over all. Oh that we might not forget all his benefits, stepping out of the night of what has been and boldly into the new dawn, out of the shock and color of Spring and into the steady green of Summer. There we may put bitterness to rest. There the sun dries our tears. There in the waking light stands new goodness: new songs to be written and sung, new words to be heard, new moments to be shared and new adventures to be dared. There on that horizon we are made like the eagles: truly free.
