Pandoraspace

I was driving home from work at 6:00 p.m. last night.  It was raining and I realized I had ceased to believe.

Since Wednesday, government officials, CNN, ABS-CBN, family and and friends have sent warnings about Typhoon Parma, a.k.a. Pepeng.  Along with those warnings came requests to pray that that Category 5 Super Typhoon skip the Philippines.  We did not need anymore rain or wind after Typhoon Ondoy.

Although I said a short prayer for everyone’s safety, I lacked conviction that anything could be done to avert the storm.  The predictions about the path of Typhoon Parma and its strength seemed so definite that I actually wondered, while driving home, how any prayer could help us now.  I caught myself thinking this thought, and before I could even think beyond it, another thought came to mind.  I thought damage was inevitable in Metro Manila.  Ten minutes later, I heard a prayer for Typhoon Parma to be averted being said over the radio.  Again, I felt that such act was futile.

From the time I left the office until I slept at around 11:00 p.m., the rain did not stop.

I woke up with the same hopelessness I had when I went to bed. Then, I tuned in on CNN and was surprised to learn that Typhoon Ondoy was no longer the super typhoon we expected and that it is veering farther away from  Metro Manila.  On the social networking sites, friends were also reporting that the Typhoon will skip Metro Manila. I was stunned, grateful, and then, humbled.

Prayers work.  I do not know why I had forgotten that prayers do work since prayers have helped me many times in the past.  I am also reminded of a thought I had in the aftermath of Typhoon Ondoy.  The thought:  At the end of the day, one realizes that, no matter how many precautions we take, how we live our lives or how much we try to control what happens to us, we can never predict how and when we will die.  This is a reminder that our lives are not in our hands but in the hands of a greater being out there.