Four years ago, during our last foray into their domain, the dinosaurs began peering menacingly over the horizon from about 15 miles out. With bodies looming larger by the minute, their fierce stares dared us to come closer.
Having no choice then but to continue on our chosen path, we defied their threats and soon found ourselves hopelessly encompassed.
U.S. Highway 59 bisects downtown Houston, Texas, where freeways lie five deep–not a desirable route for country folk under even the best of circumstances. There, dinosaurs–the center city skyscrapers inhabiting this sprawling megalopolis–glared derisively at my knee-jerk maneuvers to navigate four clogged lanes of traffic. They roared defiance at my every attempt, feeble in their city-hardened eyes.
Seeking to avoid a repeat of that ill-timed rush hour arrival, we carefully planned our departure from Houston for early Sunday morning when even dinosaurs sleep. And as these great beasts slowly sank below the horizon in the rearview mirror, I silently resolved to avoid them in the future.
Just last week, however, we found ourselves back on Highway 59, cautiously approaching the downtown dinosaur park. Even at 10:00 p.m. they grimaced and growled, sensing, perhaps, the deadly mix of anxiety and adrenalin pumping in my veins.
Nevertheless, we eased through without incident, thankful to see their bulky forms fade behind us. The next night, though, from our distant vantage point near the San Jacinto monument east of Houston, the dinosaurs loomed again upon the dark horizon.
But magically converted by time and perspective, those same fearsome behemoths of the evening before appeared in miniature, golden works of art composing a bright and beautiful skyline.
Time and perspective have often spun their web of transformation around other dinosaurs which have risen up in dread array along the varied paths of my experience. The first I recall, beasts of fear and uncertainty, regularly bared their fangs after the birth of a daughter with multiple handicaps. But thirty-one years of time and perspective now reveal benefits we couldn't see at the time. I expect to eventually evaluate her death in the same light, but eight intervening years haven't yet interposed sufficient time and perspective for all the plusses to declare themselves.
Despite our attempts at circumvention, pestiferous dinosaurs of varied ilk–sickness, surgery, job change and loss, pressures, unfavorable circumstances, conflicts–will roar down upon all of us. Thankfully, most of them gradually sink below the horizon of forgetfulness as we naturally move on.
We'll probably travel Highway 59 again–despite a persistent wariness of the restless downtown natives. For whatever giant God allows to rise up against us, He can eventually put down through liberal applications of the healing balm of time and perspective.
Copyright 2004 James McAlister
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