There is a sacred place in, of all places, Fond Du Lac, Wisconsin. In a park there, on a memorial bench dedicated to his late wife, an elderly gentleman leaves one daisy every day in honor of her favorite song was:

“I’ll give you a daisy a day, dear

I’ll give you a daisy a day

I’ll love you until

The rivers run still

And the four winds we know blow away.”

With the deep snow and frigid temperatures of this winter, however, his daily practice was made very difficult.

Until one day.

Two strangers who worked for the local Parks Department noticed tracks in the deep snow leading to a bench bearing a plaque with a woman’s name and photo. In each of the holes drilled on the metal bench, there was a single daisy. This was clearly someone’s sacred place. For these employees, shoveling paths through the park is not part of their job in the dead of winter. But they decided to make an exception in this case. So, on their own time, every day, they shoveled a path from the parking lot to that bench so that the man could have easier access to his wife’s memorial bench.

When the man saw the cleared path, he reported that his knees nearly bucked in shock at this act of kindness from strangers.

Today’s Lenten reflection word is PLACE.

Where is your sacred place? And what are the obstacles, physical or spiritual, that make it difficult for you to reach it?

Today, I wonder, how can I identify and remove my own obstacles, to enter a sacred space in myself?

And, even more importantly, like those Parks Department employees, how can I open my self to observe the metaphorical footsteps in the deep snow that clue me in to how I can help someone else reach their own Sacred Place?