A kick in pants from God with my cousin used as the vessel – A short story

Sometimes I fear that this book has a life of its own. At other times I have the sneaking suspicion that it would be content to remain nebulous and untold. But, this is a request that I am unable to honor.

I was awakened from a light sleep that was brought about from my frustration at the direction that my book is taking. It was the ringing of my phone next to me that loosened the tenuous grasp that the Sandman had on me.

I grumbled a groggy hello and before the voice on the other end could respond, the photo ID pasted on the screen revealed that it was my cousin.

A smile crept across my face as I sat up and we exchanged pleasantries.  It always is good to hear from him, the abundant energy in his voice has been contagious ever since we were kids and I felt myself being infected as we started catching up on the travails in our respective lives.

When we got around to talking about me, he tendered a query that was simple enough on the surface…

“What do you want to do?”

It wasn’t as if I was being asked to formulate a solution to a quadratic equation with time elapsing.  Actually, it was a fair question, it was succinct, clear cut and straight to the point.

But for some reason I hesitated, fearful to say what I knew to be true, because of the sheer audacity of it.

“I want to write”

There was no laughter, recoiling or condemnation hurled at me, apparently I needed hear myself say that, out loud.

My retort was met with only love and encouragement as with anything that I’ve shared with him throughout our lives. He has been an incubator of my aspirations in more ways than I realize.

Our conversation was nothing short of powerful as he provided me with clarity, when I was enveloped in a fog of indecision minutes prior.

Dare I say that I this was an “Aha” moment or one of those instances where God has saw fit to remind me that, he is…

After all my life has been full of these interactions.

God often makes his presence known through events, circumstances in our life or through the people in our life. I guess it was my cousin’s turn to be the instrument of divine intervention and  as always the timing was impeccable.