Prophetic Dust

Yesterday, the dust was from Africa, in a wind storm called ghibli, and today the wind is from Turkey and is called the grecale, I think.

The point is that I and my flat are covered in dust. This dust reminds me of the ruins of the great cathedrals of Northern Africa and Turkey, the ruins of Christianity, which no longer exists in any of the seven great churches mentioned in the book of Revelation.

Dust is the symbol of humanity and Livy called the sirocco vulturnus. 

We are the stuff of the wind and rain.

Genesis 3:19Douay-Rheims 

19 In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread till thou return to the earth, out of which thou wast taken: for dust thou art, and into dust thou shalt return.

Walking around with sand in one's eyes makes one aware of one's own body's destination.

It is a good thing to think about death and the fact that all of us will be dust. 

My sister is dust and so is her casket. This does not bother me as I grew up going to funerals and hearing sermons on the Four Last Things.

But, it does not hurt us to think of our own passing from life to death to life again.

When I am wiping up dust from the floor, the counter tops, my clothes, shoes and even my breviary, I wonder if some of this dust comes from the old basilica in which St. Augustine gave his sermons.

Am I cleaning away sacred bits? This dust is prophetic, reminding me of whom I am and the fact that this beautiful city which I see before me could be a pile of dust in the very near future.

I always wanted to be an archaeologist, and this dust is the dust of centuries. I could be cleaning up part of Tell el-Amarna.