Joy

At the end of the day, the one thing that mattered most was the big red bow.

The day of Elli's Christmas program found us all running late.  Her mommy asked me to fix her hair and so I grabbed the Christmas gift wrap ribbon and fastened it in her hair.  She ran to the mirror and declared: "I look like a big present!"  She was happy and excited and so was I.

We arrived at school a few minutes late.  The day was cold, but my little granddaughter ran into the school quickly, and I promised I would see her soon at the program.  I was nearly first in line with the other proud parents and grandparents.  I stood for fifteen minutes and then sat another thirty minutes while the excitement in the school gym mounted.  There was standing room only, and it seemed that most people had cameras in their hands as the 9:30 start time neared.  The anticipation was palpable. 

Then it happened.  The sound of bells echoed through the old gym as nearly two hundred pre-schoolers and kindergartners entered the room marching down each side while ringing their very own jingle bells.  I could find Elli easily because, of course, I was watching for the big red bow.  After all the children entered, the curtain opened, and there in front of us were all those sweet smiling baby faces.  For most of us there, I am certain, our eyes were focused on the one child that was special to us.

As all those little faces looked out at us, I must admit that a tear filled my eye.  I thought of all of the love that was in the room right at that moment.  I thought back to other Christmases when each of my four children's little faces had been looking at me in that very same school gym.  I was sitting close enough that I could hear my little Elli tell her friend that she could see her Grandma.  The moment was etched in my heart as the highlight of my day.

Oh, the day was not an easy day by any means.  An important doctor visit and news of a potential heart procedure were part of the day.  A long drive in rush hour traffic was part of the day.  Cold winter weather was part of the day.  Hurt feelings in the family were part of the day.  Sadness and anxiety were part of the day.  Tears and pain were part of the day.  Fear and uncertainty were part of the day.

In the end, however, when my mind and body quieted from the busy day, it was joy I felt. Somehow in my mind, the over-riding thought was the big red bow. 

And so it was on the 15th of December, ten days before Christmas 2009, that I received the gift God wanted me to have this season.  He wanted me to remember that no matter what--no matter how messed up the world is or how messed up I am--or how messed up relationships can be--there is joy because He sent His Son to replace all the hurts the world can throw at us.  His love for me became flesh 2000 years ago so that I could rest in Him at the end of each long day.

Yes, this Christmas, when I think of the tiny baby Jesus in a manger, I will see his little swaddling clothes all wrapped up with a big red bow.   And I will know that I have been blessed beyond comprehension.  I will be reminded once again that Jesus is the best present ever given. 

Thank you dear Heavenly Father for your gift of joy to me and all mankind. 
May the anticipation with which all the loved ones waited to see their little children sing holiday music in the old school gym pale in comparison with the anticipation with which we wait for your Son this Advent season.  Amen 

Joy to the World!

November

Darkness drifts in around four in the afternoon these days.                                           

Sale ads clog the newspaper.

Holiday events are filling my social calendar.

It is the end of November...and I feel sad.                                         

Oh, this November has been filled with stressful events it is true....but then again, isn't life, simply stated, a series of stressful events?  Yes, it is a rambling writing I find myself doing this last day of November. 

I am sad that the time of saying good-bye to my dear mother-in-law is officially over.  She died one month ago today...peacefully leaving this life as she slept one morning.

Planning where to have the memorial, and then planning all of the details took up most of the month.  My brother-in-law staying with us for a week was an amazing time of reminiscing and getting to know each other better.  Seeing extended family at a lovely memorial service was so sweet and so special.  Receiving love, support and care from many friends and family was a blessing.  Celebrating the Thanksgiving holiday and the remembrance of my in-laws 70th wedding anniversary were touching November events.  Shopping on Black Friday for a new purple Christmas dress for Elli, and then finishing up all of the holiday left-overs yesterday culminated the seemingly endless month.  All of the events came and went and were acknowledged appropriately, but now it is today...and now what?

I feel so sad.

No doubt recovering from surgery during the time of bereavement has been a strain on me.  Recovery is just plain hard work anymore.  I don't bounce back quite so easily.  And certainly cardiac concerns, stress tests, Holter monitors during this time have added stress...or...could it be...the times, the events...have created the cardiac concerns.  I will see what the doctor tells me when I visit him this afternoon.

My mother-in-law lived in Florida for the past many years.  I did not talk to her very often, but I knew she was there and I knew how much she meant to my family...of course...especially to her son, my husband.  He talked to her several times a day.  When my father-in-law died in February, it seemed that grieving was somewhat easier than it is now.  Now the grieving for both of them just seems hard.  I believe that they are together in heaven with their Lord.  I do not grieve without hope--but oh how I grieve.

We have looked at hundreds of photos over the past weeks...photos dating back into the 1800's.  Moments in time--moments in the lives of those who have gone before--shuffled around on the dining room table.  Is it possible to take in so much emotion at once?

Why is it that we think just because a person had a long life and a peaceful death that it won't hurt so much when they are gone?  I think we just try to convince ourselves of silly things like that in an attempt to accomodate the huge loss we feel.  Maybe if we say something is not so bad, we will be able to handle things better....maybe...maybe not.

It is November.  It is a gray day.  The house is silent.  I have many tasks I could choose to do.  Instead I sit at the computer hoping to make sense of the saddness I feel.

So far, it is not working.

Oh, how I miss you Mom...

Empathy

Walking through the halls of the DCAM, as it is called, I made observations.  The medical center is a place that I frequent quite often, and I can't help but think of the people I meet who frequent the place as well.

I am a perpetual patient, yesterday visiting three different clincs within the Duchossois Center for Advanced Medicine at the University of Chicago.  There was a post-op visit in the ortho clinic and a pre-op visit in the ENT clinic, and then I accompanied Mr. Jorie as he had a consultation in the neurology clinic. 

Gratefully now I can walk independently and make my way up and down the elevators and in and out of the parking garage without the aid of an assistive device. I count my blessings as I observe many people who are not as fortunate as myself...and I always wonder what the world looks like through their eyes.

The young woman and her service animal, a huge and beautiful greyhound, sat next to me in the neurology clinic.  She told me that she had MS and her dog, which she had trained herself, assisted her with her balance and helped her compensate for her lack of peripheral vision.  She was happy and seemed delighted to tell me "her story."  I wondered what the world looked like through her eyes.

Her father continued talking with me after the young woman left the waiting area.  He told me how proud of her he was and continued on with her story, telling me that she visited hospitals and nursing homes with her dog...the patients did not need to sit up or get out of bed because the dog was tall enough to put his head right up on their laps.  I wondered what the world looked like through the father's eyes.

A middle-aged mom and dad entered the neurology clinic waiting area with their teenage daughter who was permanently wheelchair bound.  They looked intent as they studied the papers in their hands.  Their daughter looked at me rather blankly and then I smiled at her.  It took her a moment, but she smiled a great big crooked smile back at me.  I wondered what the world looked like through her eyes and through the eyes of her parents who would care for her every need always.

In the ENT clinic I waited patiently and observed other people as they came and went.  In came a woman in a wheelchair being pushed presumably by her husband.  She wore a mask over her mouth and nose and her head hung low.  He looked tired.  I wondered what their world looked like.  I wondered if she had a chronic illness and he was her caregiver, or perhaps she was only temporarily ill and would be well soon.  I wondered if she could take care of him if the tables were turned.

I wondered about the mom pushing her child in a wheelchair.  The youngster looked as if he had cerebral palsy.  I wondered about the mom who was walking behind her six-year-old daughter, another apparent victim of cerebral palsy.  The happy child walked awkwardly and her mother had to tell her to watch where she was going so she would not run into people.  I wondered what the moms had thought about when they were pregnant with their children...and I wondered what they thought about each night when they fell into bed exhausted.

I wondered about the woman in the elevator who wore a scarf over her bald head, and I wondered about the vacant look on the person who accompanied her.  I wondered about the old man in the wheelchair who wore oxygen.  His IV bag hung on the pole of the chair above him.  I wondered about the woman who could only take tiny steps.  I watched her labor to walk as she left the ortho waiting area.


Patients and family members alike--we all roamed the halls of the big city hospital.  How did we look to each other?  What had brought us to the medical center?  What were we hoping when we came and what were we thinking when we left?


I never leave the medical center quite the same person as when I came.  I have been given information from my doctors that often impacts my physical well-being and my outlook for the future.  I may have been told things that will change my life.  However, often the most profound feelings I have when I leave the medical center are the thoughts and emotions I have experienced as I looked at all the people who have shared the day at the DCAM with me.   

I wonder what the world looks like to them.

Do you think they wonder what the world looks like to me?

Do you think we crossed paths for a reason?

Expectations

What do you do when your expectations have not been met...

...when you feel that someone has let you down...

...when you are disappointed in yourself for hoping against hope that things would be different...

What do you do?

Do you ask yourself if there is something you should have done or should have said differently?  Do you run things over and over in your mind?  Do you try to forget the hurt?  Do you place blame? 

Oh dear, oh dear...oh woe is me. 

No!

I refuse to be discouraged over things which I have no control.  Instead I will be grateful for what I have.  I will live and love.  I will chalk this one up, and find today to be just glorious.  I will choose to stop the loop in my brain that would bring me down.  And when I stop it, I will replace it with moments of delight that the day has brought. 

I will go to God and lay it all at His feet.

That's what I will do.

Oh yes, and I will forgive and keep on loving....and of course keep on hoping....there's always hope. 

Light is so much better than darkness.

It's good to be 62 and be so wise.

Happy Birthday to me.                                               

September

Try to remember the kind of September when grass was green and grain was yellow...




...oh, how I loved that song when I first heard it--in fact I still do.




And here it is already--the last day of September 2009.




This September has been especially beautiful, with mild days and slightly cool evenings.  The cicadas singing the day away, and the flowers in my planters still in bloom seem like a bonus.  There have been a few rainy days, but those gray days just served to brighten up the lawns again, keeping them green a bit longer.  Although I know that fall is upon us, I have truly enjoyed September.  It has been summer's little bonus for me this year.




Maybe this simple pleasure will last me all the way through the winter to come, but no matter what, September days have been glorious, and they have made me happy.




Happy is good.


I hope you are there too on this last day of September 2009....


...in that happy, contented place.

Reminiscing

There it was again...another one of those "life just doesn't get any better than this" spontaneous moments.

Late summer, special little girl, flowered pink dress, grapes in the grass...

...you get the picture...and what a precious picture it is.  Do you think Elli will remember the moment? 

I have been thinking since writing my previous post that, in spite of my dreary ramblings then, my memory has indeed been a wonderful thing.  I have been blessed to collect a garden of precious moments myself. 

Just a few I thought of today:

-the excitement of delivering a May Day basket to my friend when I was just Elli's age-

-the joy of sitting on my bed listing a series of letters I had learned in first grade, while my big brother told me the made-up words I was making-

-how beautiful I felt on Christmas Eve when my Grandpa saw me coming down the staircase-

-how happy I was to get my first two-wheeler-

Oh, those are just a few happy moments from my childhood, which are forever etched in my mind.

And I cannot neglect moments from my grown-up life either, such as:

-the moment I first told Mr. Jorie that I loved him...we were on the campus of ISU close to the fine arts building-

-the joy and fulfillment I felt when I found out I was pregnant with my first child following years of infertility...appropriately, my friend Lonna was with me-

-the moment that I realized God had carried me through an intensely serious medical crisis-

-how I felt the first time I held my granddaughter and then my grandson-

No doubt I could sit at my computer for days on end and remember with joy and love the good times of my life. And perhaps that thought is what I will focus on, even though my memory is able to bring up those sad and difficult times of life.  I can choose to let those painful thoughts come and go quickly, and  I can use them to help me realize how beautiful, and how numerous, the happy memories are. 

There are so many moments each day worth cherishing.  I will continue to look for those...

...those precious "grapes in the grass" moments.

Forgetfulness

Why is it that I can remember when I fell and scraped my knee while on the way to my friend Sandy's house when I was five, but I can't remember why I walked from the bedroom into the kitchen?


Why is it that I can remember how I felt when my sixth grade teacher wrongly accused me of cheating, but I can't remember where I put my purse?


Why is it that I can remember how lonely I felt when my college roommate went home for the year, but I can't remember why I stopped at Walgreen's?


Why is it that I can remember the pain of a dislocated hip and the horrible incompetence surrounding my care, but I can't remember a simple word when it is on the tip of my tongue?


Why is it that I can remember how I felt when my children didn't get along, but I can't remember which street I meant to turn onto?




Of course there is that short-term memory thing all of us Baby Boomers are becoming too familiar with, but there is more to it than that.


Oh how I wish I could choose what to remember and what to forget.

I would not hold onto all of those painful experiences any more if I could just wish them away.

And of course, I would remember where I put my keys so as not to become frustrated with myself for being so stupid.

But life isn't like that is it? Memories of hurts tend to stay with us. But I suppose what is important is how we handle those thoughts that haunt us.

If someone has wronged me, I eventually get to that place of forgiveness, but I think God lets me remember the situation so I can grow in wisdom.

And, as for looking for the keys--God must certainly be teaching me patience.

Where am I going with the thoughts in my blog today? Oh, you see, I have already forgotten...


...bless you for remembering to read my wanderings and my wonderings.

...and bless you for remembering to remember me with love just the same as I remember you.