One Saturday night several years ago, I rented a couple of movies and ordered take-out at my favorite Chinese restaurant in town. Sitting in the front lobby while I waited for my Chinese chicken salad and potstickers, I passed my time on a bench next to a medium-sized aquarium. The restaurant itself was quiet for a Saturday night–a function perhaps of its terrible location in the middle of a rundown mini-industrial park. It’s as if the restaurant is in hiding and does not want to be found. Or it only wants to be found by a worthy, hungry few who happen across its vast and empty parking lot–like a strange, culinary pilgrimage one must take in their own hometown. Whatever the case may be, I worry about its future. And this thought crossed my mind as I studied the fading decor and eerie quiet of the restaurant.

Next to me in the aquarium swam turtles. Small turtles with bluish-grey necks and tiny black eyes that stood out against their skin. I counted three. They were inhabiting the same glass box as some sort of amorphous sucker fish and a couple of brightly colored fish, one of whom looked unwell as he swam sluggishly along the bottom of the tank.

Of the three turtles, one was taking a nap on a piece of wood that was partially exposed above the water. The other two were swimming near each other. I stood to get a better look at them. And, to my surprise, they wanted to get a better look at me. I stepped to the left and the turtles turned, tracking me with their eyes. I stepped to the right. The turtles again moved to follow me with the timing and elegance of miniature synchronized-swimmers. This went on for awhile. Finally, one of the turtles lost interest in our little dance and paddled away to another corner of the aquarium. The other, however, seemed to have locked eye contact with me demanding my full attention. Ordinary time ceased and I was suddenly transfixed by the sense that this small, caged reptile was, in fact, an all-knowing guardian of the mysteries of the universe. And so I did as I have been taught to do in the presence of such power. I prayed. To the turtle gods, the God of the Turtles, not knowing how they should be addressed.

I addressed my prayers to these creatures on behalf of a patient of mine who was dying. She was young–in her fifties–and full of desire to live. Her body was losing its ability to be a vessel for that desire and her heart was flooding its banks with deep grief and profound fear at seeing the inevitable approach. And standing there at this moment–eye to eye with God in a reptilian form–I was struck by the remembrance of this fact: her love for turtles. In the way that some people are mystically drawn to horses or dogs in their childhood this woman had been drawn to turtles. And apparently they had been drawn to her; stories of turtles behaving like old friends in her presence abounded in her home. And standing before that aquarium waiting for my Chinese take-out, I realized that the turtle gods would not leave her. God had come to her in those turtles just as I was experiencing God at that very moment. And knowing that God was present in these turtles, with her, with me, with the world, in all things somehow made the inevitable seem more bearable.

The moment left almost as quickly as it had come. I abruptly sat down again as I became self-conscious of the fact that I was in a holy stare-down with a turtle. And that might freak the restaurant staff out. So I continued to watch the turtles swim, attempting to appear scientifically nonchalant while secretly hoping for another revelation from the turtle gods.

I guess I got my wish. But not in the way I had expected. The holiness of the moment turned into a panic as one of the turtles–the one that had first swam away–got stuck while swimming between a pipe at the back of the aquarium and the piece of wood that stood parallel to it. Its shell was too thick and round to squeeze through the narrow space. For a horrible second, I watched as the turtle flailed its little arms and legs in futile circles. Just as I thought to call over a staff person, I watched as the other turtle swam to his trapped friend, raised his little webbed feet, and pushed down on the other turtle’s head and neck like a contestant spinning the wheel on the Price is Right, freeing both of them to continue on with life in the aquarium.

I was absolutely dumbfounded by having witnessed this act of salvation. A second later, a young woman brought me my order-to-go. And before I had a chance to even say good-bye to the turtles or to acknowledge their gift to me, I found myself standing by my car in a large, weedy parking lot. From behind my steering wheel, I laughed out loud to myself. I think I actually said the words: “Turtles are hella smart!” I was profoundly moved by what I had witnessed, what the turtles had taught me about living between worlds, between life and death, between the overlapping realities of turtles and God-turtles. I knew the road ahead of my patient would be hard but I also left that restaurant with a deeper faith in the truth that I hope to be able to reflect to her–that she cannot ever be truly alone, even in death.

I continue to be overwhelmed with the idea that these small revelations of the Divine are happening all around us, all the time. They do not need us to happen. But they happen, nonetheless. It is a grace they happen. It is a miracle we ever witness them at all. Who knows if I will ever meet the eye of a turtle again and see for a clear, precious moment the infinite beauty of life? Even if I never do again, I know the world is swimming in the possibility of it.