Living On A Prayer

I finished work at 11pm tonight. I kind of like working late at my office - when nobody is around on my floor, I gamely leave the glass door open and play my CDs loud as I please. As I cleared up papers here and there and prepared to lock up and leave, I found myself looking out again towards the new National Library, which was also in the process of closing up for the night. My office is directly opposite the LIbrary - I get a pretty good view of the people walking around the upper floors.

I feel some kind of kinship with the new library. 3 years ago, when we first moved School of Thought into this building, the library was nothing but a gigantic brown construction site, all boarded up and enclosed. From the street level, you could not tell the mess that was going on inside. From my sixth floor perch, I could see everything within. As I slowly found my feet building the school, I found myself spending many a late night alone, looking out at the construction site.

For months, it seemed like nothing was happening. Nothing obvious at least. In architecture, you learn that the foundational work takes the longest. It takes months to analyse the soil condition, test the loading it can take, decide on the best piling system to use. For months, while I worked, so did a whole army of construction workers, industriously digging away, sinking pile after pile in what seemed like unending labour.

There was some kind of comfort in staring over all that foundational work. I felt the parallel in my own life: I was building a school, making sure all the foundations were right, trying not to do anything wrong, fretting about making mistakes, wondering about it's place in my walk with God.

Lying beyond the library site is an old church. There were many nights where I would stand at the window, staring at the cross on its steeple and feeling somehow comforted that it was there - watching over the construction work, watching over me, watching over my school. I would press my hand to the glass and pray out of sheer need. I gave the school and myself over to Him. I prayed for guidance, for comfort, for confidence. I would thank God for keeping the school going despite my lack of experience, despite my lack of anal managerial skill or razor-sharp business acumen. I would pray for fear to go away. I would pray and pray for a sign to show me what this was all about. I would tell God to take everything and shape it into whatever form He wanted for I truly felt lost so many times. I only knew how to deal with things day by day, with nothing more than hope in His wisdom. I wanted so many times to be lazy, to be half-hearted, to be irreponsible.

So tonight, as I looked out at the library in its pristine, whiteness, glowing peacefully in the night. I thought of how far it had come from its muddy beginnings - without structure, without foundation, without any thing that might hint at its beautiful future except for a bunch of blueprints conceived by some architect. Faithfully, construction workers trusted in that blueprint, trusted in that architect and just built their hearts out. Somehow the small work that was done each day added up.

I remember once the foundations were laid, the superstructure of the Library went up so fast I was astonished. I remember coming to work one day and being really shocked to see the first few columns soaring triumphantly from the ground. From there, the next few months was BAMBAMBAMBAM - column, floor, panelling, cladding. The speed was amazing. The heights the building reached was astonishing. For months, I could not grasp the scale of the building that was evolving before me with such blase ease.

When I look at the library, I see a metaphor of my work in the school. It comforts me.
I trust someday I will see the true form it will take on, far from its muddy beginnings, far from the capabilities of the singular construction worker.

Thank you God for being my visionary. I owe you too much to conceive.