On Forgetting About Prayer

Today was one of those days where nothing, from start to finish, went as I planned. Nothing went badly wrong, it's just that nothing went really well. At work, my laptop gave me all sorts of trouble, refusing to link me to the school's server. Then, an important, comprehensive evaluation of me, which I had been prepping for and anticipating for days, was postponed. 

By the time I got to the after-school faculty meeting, I was a knot of anxiety.  My girlfriend K, my best friend at work, eight months pregnant with her first child, sat down beside me in the school auditorium. Turns out her laptop too is being disobedient. I told her how terribly, terribly stressed I was feeling.

My friend turned to me: this friend who's been dealing with high blood pressure, this friend who is anxious over the impending birth of her first child, this friend to whom I just last week gave a Book of Hours and encouraged her to pray,  this friend who is finding solace in the psalms, the canticles and the prayers in the rhythm of the prayers.

"Have you prayed today?" K. asked. 

"Uh....No. Not all day," I answered

So on the drive home, at the red lights, I prayed my afternoon prayers. 

What a difference it makes when I remember that God, not me, is the master of my days and that God has a path and a purpose for me.  What a difference it makes when I don't forget about prayer.

If the Lord does not build the house,

  its builders labor in vain.

If the Lord does not watch over a city,

  its workmen guard it in vain.

It is vain for you to rise before the dawn

  and go late to your rest,

  eating the bread of toil –

  to those he loves, the Lord gives sleep.