Palm Sunday in Tijuana

I hate driving in Tijuana.

I'm sure there are worse places to be behind the wheel, but anywhere that it takes you three hours to go a mile or two at least deserves an honorable mention. Take a roadside festival, a political protest, a couple of strategically placed stalled vehicles, and the ever-lovable Tijuana police department (who, as the running joke went, "in their infinite wisdom" closed down several roads, apparently at random), and it was neither a very restful nor a very worshipful experience of Palm Sunday.

But we did get the crowds. Hallelujah, did we ever get the crowds.

I did a bit of reflecting upon it today. (The experience itself did not greatly facilitate reflection.) I thought about the thousands and thousands of people cramming themselves into that dirty, ugly little city, all trying to get home. I thought about the beggars, street vendors, and crooked cops. I thought about the abandoned kids I'd spent the weekend with. And I thought about how if we really believed someone could come along and fix the whole fucked-up mess we've made of this place, we'd probably take our jackets off and lay them on the ground to make a road for Him too.

That week 2000 years ago didn't turn out quite how anyone in the crowd expected. A lot of what they thought was about to happen, we're still waiting for. Maybe a lot of what we think ought to be happening, we're still waiting for too.

Waiting is hard. Disappointments are hard. Inching along towards the goal, getting nowhere fast and sometimes just getting nowhere--that's hard too. And the thing about Palm Sunday is that you know the worst is yet to come.

But so is the best. Hang on, folks. We're getting closer.