Stories from the Steps

GOOD FRIDAY STRIPES, ONE:
“If I’d a’ had somewhere else to go, I’d a’ went.”

One of NASCAR’s auto racing greats, Cale Yarborough, made this statement post race in 1970 after an unavoidable crash at South Carolina’s historic Darlington Raceway. Few drivers are spared from collecting, win or lose, the storied tracks’ most notorious symbol of car damage, the Darlington Stripe.
      A stripe gained in ‘70 by Yarborough that resulted in the Wood Brothers famous number 21 Mercury pointing the wrong direction with two wheels propped on a guardrail. I thought about this quote over Passion Week’s Maundy Thursday morning coffee. I thought about one who asked his three closest friends, in today’s lingo, the ones he “did life” with, to go with him to a garden to pray, the friends complied, & went…to sleep. 
      Later, in the same garden, one of his pit crew of 12 went for silver coins that sent him to go collect some stripes far worse than those from a South Carolina racetrack. Before the silver collecting, the one hosted dinner for the twelve…& went &  washed the feet of the twelve.
      Day broke & an 11 man crew remained. One had the courage to go on & stand with the one’s mother. The other ten decided to go, the other ten just went. The loudest, brashest & sword swingingest of the ten offered the loudest, brashest & tongue swingingest denial accompanied by a rooster singing backup.
     The one that was sold out & abandoned, the one who went on to be wrecked by whips, beatings, a mocking crown of thorns, was then forced to go on a path of suffering to the ultimate suffering. While nails pierced & dice were rolled for His clothes, mocking signs doubted his kingship & voices told the one to save himself.
     He was a king. He was capable of saving himself. He was capable of avoiding the stripes. He could’ve decided to go & been gone.
      Instead, he never left, he never went. Propped on a cross, he hung by spikes but was attached by love. Through the mocking, the piercing, & soldiers shooting dice for his cloak, he turned to his side & told one paying for his crimes, “…you’re coming with me”.
     There are times that I end up facing the wrong way with more than just two wheels off the ground, both the victim & perpetrator of my choices. No checkered piece of cloth was waved at the end of that Friday, the victory flag wasn’t waved ’til Sunday. The flag was waved in the form of a rolled stone & empty burial garments by one who went to his last meal with one who would go to sell him out. One who my dad used to say, “wasn’t for the sweet by & by, but the bitter here & now”. One that picks me up when I’m both the victim & perpetrator of my crimes. One who could’ve found somewhere else to go 2,000 years ago. One I’ve given reason to go, but one who never went…