Today’s find: Mudjacking

They came without warning, the members of the mudjacking crew.

One minute, the neighborhood is peaceful and quiet. The next, every ear assaulted by unholy screeching – the disturbing vibes of diamond-tip saws and hammer drills ripping through concrete. The rumble of the slurry truck follows close behind. And before you know it, the job is complete – the crew is gone.

But they leave markings behind – evidence that something significant has happened here…a subtle shift in the lay of the land, an uneven path leveled, the way once again made clear.

I’m glad for the mudjacking, I suppose. Still I can’t help but notice how it’s an imperfect fix: the fresh concrete plugs providing a stark contrast to the grimy material of the 30-year-old sidewalk into which they’ve been poured. Proof is now ever-present: this dwelling place is getting old.

The sidewalk repaired. But perhaps not “as good as new.”

Ironic, how the mudjacking serves to unsettle my spirit even as it smooths and elevates certain slabs that had become out-of-joint over time. I’d gotten used to “not noticing” the imperfections, I suppose. But now, here’s a chance to start over. Begin again. Only, though, if I embrace the (healing) imperfections that are clear for all the world to see.

I wonder if Saint Peter (as the years went by, and his beard turned grey) ever felt something like a mudjacking at work in his soul. Today’s feast, the Transfiguration, gives me a chance to contemplate the question. We hear, in the second reading, his declaration of faith in Jesus:

Beloved: We did not follow cleverly devised myths when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we had been eyewitnesses of his majesty…

An eyewitness, yes. But one with decidedly wobbly knees, wouldn’t you say? Recall that mere months after having traipsed up Mount Tabor to receive this privileged glimpse of Christ in his glory, Peter would flat-out deny that he’d ever known Jesus. Remarkably, an astonishing mountaintop experience had somehow receded in Peter’s memory – covered over by brokenness and fear.

And no less astonishing, perhaps, is this: Jesus seems to anticipate the potholes that would scar Peter’s (and every disciple’s) soul. Cowering, he is: Both the one called the Rock and his companions are very much afraid, even before they leave the mountaintop.

Still, notice how Jesus reaches out to them.

Touches them.

Invites them to continue along on the journey.

“Rise, and do not be afraid,” Jesus says. Walk with Me, even in your brokenness, he seems to say. We’ve got some mudjacking to do.

Surely the mountaintop experience is meant to be just the beginning of the journey.

Let us pause now…to recall that we are in the presence of the Holy & Merciful One.

IHS