Hope

Image Credit: Ideals magazine

A New Chapter

By Sandra Lloyd

I took one final look around at this place that had been our home, our haven for so many years that I hardly could remember being anyplace else.  It hadn’t been “all good”, life never is, but it had been secure, a soft place to be when the world “out there” had often been treacherous.

But things were changing now, and it was time to go.  Onward to what was next.

What was next?   I didn’t really know.  Other than the fact that a chapter had ended, and a new and unfamiliar one was now beginning.  With heavy and tremulous heart, I managed to draw a deep breath past the sobs I refused to release, and forced myself on leaden feet, to turn and walk out through that beloved threshold for the final time.

“God”, I prayed, “I know that you know what you are doing, but just for the record, I don’t like this”.  And with that, we left behind everything that was familiar, and headed West.

We took turns and drove through the night, mile after endless mile, until it was all a blur.  We would be cutting it a little close, he was due to report to work bright and early  Monday morning,  but by switching off behind the wheel, and stopping only for the obligatory refueling of cars and tummies, potty, and stretch breaks, we should be able to make it in time to blow up the air mattresses and get a good nights rest.  It all felt sort of like a strange dream to me.  I guess I probably was in a state akin to shock.  The flat green miles of Virginia were far behind us, and already the scenery outside the window looked completely different.  The hills of Kentucky were pretty.  Some parts of Missouri were breathtaking, and soon I found myself mesmerized by God’s creativity and the unique variations from one state to the next.  Each place we stopped the folks seemed friendly, not so much like strangers, but almost like folks who could be my friends and neighbors, were we to end our trek here.  People are people, wherever you go, I guess.

Before I knew it, my dread and heaviness had begun to give way to a different and long-forgotten feeling.  Could it be?  Adventure, at this stage of my life?  I was incredulous, to say the least.  Our life had become so confined for so many years, due to circumstances that were largely outside our control.  We’d done the best we could to follow the example of the Apostle Paul, and be content, and I believe we were content, if not wholly satisfied.  But we stopped dreaming a long ways back.  After a while, we no longer dared to get our hopes up; too many disappointments, too many set-backs.

You know, it was funny, but by the time we made the next-to-the-last turn, onto the street that would now be “our street”, my dread had morphed into a sort of nervous excitement.  I could almost swear there was hope, even anticipation in my heart.  It was a new beginning.  How often I had longed for newness in the old circumstances somehow.  I began to notice that I was standing a little straighter, even leaning into the future a little.  Giving up the familiar was maybe not so bad after all.  I felt lighter than I had in years.

As we pulled up in front of the house we had thus far only seen in pictures, I lingered a moment, wanting to form a picture of my own.  I wanted to remember this moment, because if I knew anything, I knew that it doesn’t take long at all for many years to pass and for new experiences to turn into memories.  We’d raised our kids in the old house.  Would this one see our sons take wives, and make us grandparents?  Yes, it was an unusual age for pulling up stakes and putting down new roots, but in a way, I felt years younger.  I guess newness has that effect.  God, it’s been a long, long time since we had “looked forward” to anything.  You get to the place where you keep your eyes only on what is right in front of you.  What you have to get through.  You learn as you age, that  the vitality you hope to regain, isn’t coming back, you tear a few entries off the old “things I hope to do” list, and you end up just muddling through.  Yet from time to time, your spirit rises up, tries to pull you into the clouds where you used to soar.  But those old cinder-blocks of work-a-day life, don’t let that kite get far.

In a rare encore appearance, my daring spirit reached right up into my mental kite and cinder block image, and darn if she didn’t cut that string!  I could swear I saw her wink!

“You gonna sit there daydreaming all day, or are you gonna get out of that car and start your new life?

I chuckled, then smiled up into the eyes of my dear husband.  New hope glimmered in his own eyes.  I took the proffered hand, and with a spring in our steps, together we crossed a brand new threshold.

Now the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that ye may abound in hope, through the power of the Holy Ghost.”

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“Hope”

Hope is a thing with feathers

That perches in the soul

And sings the tune without words,

And never stops at all,

And sweetest in the gale is heard;

And sore must be the storm

That could abash the little bird

That kept so many warm.

I’ve heard it in the chillest land,

And on the strangest sea;

Yet never in extremity

It asked a crumb of me.

Emily Dickenson (1830-1886)

Lake Peigneur, the biggest man-made vortex ever

You’ll love this fascinating historical account posted by Elizabeth Prata, who recently blogged on the topic of the sinkhole drama that’s playing out  in Louisiana.  She digs up some of the most interesting stuff!!! Love her blog The End Time at Blogspot.  (See link in my blogroll).

Lake Peigneur, the biggest man-made vortex ever.

Angel in the Pre-op

While I am writing in the genre of interesting true storeies, another one comes to mind.  In December of ’09 I needed surgery on my back.  It was during another one of the times when my several medical conditions seemed to all decide to exacerbate at once, and I fell and ruptured a disk.  The orthopedic neurosurgeon who was to do my surgery, was highly recommended and very organized and thorough in all aspects of the surgery, from pre-op assessment, to follow-up after.  So on the week of sugery, he has the patient come in for their pre0-op work-up, and a class with an RN, to educate the patients on just what they can expect, what to do and not do after suregery, and especially what to call him about in the days immediatly after. As a mom who isn’t done raising her kids,   I was very concerned about the risks of the surgery, as it would be the first anesthesia I’d had since the narcolepsy was diagnosed, and besides that, it was my spine!    The whole pre-op session was a couple of hours long, and there were only 2 other peope in the class who would be having surgery by this same doctor.  The older fellow introduced himself as Dr. Benjamin McDaniel, and he told us that he would be going to a local nursing home for several weeks after his surgery because he had no one to help him at home.  He was quite personable.   Everything about going to doctors is very anxiety-laden for me, since I have had years worth of bad experiences in pursuing diagnosis.  After the class, I went back to the pre-op testing waiting area, waiting for my turn with the nurses and doctor.  And Dr. Benjamin soon came in and sat down, and struck up a conversation with me.   He told me that I reminded him of his now-deceased daughter-in-law, whose name happened to be the same as mine.  He told me that his son and she had 2 teenage boys when she died, and that as their Grandfather, he had concerns for how they’d all fare after her death, because he felt that had his own wife died and left him with 2 teens, he wouldn’t have known how in the world to raise them right on his own.  But he went on to say, my son is a busy lawyer, but do you know, he made those kids a priority, and they thrived, and today one has his Masters and the other is working on his Bachelors degree.  Dr. McDaniel talked about his wife and how much he loved her and depended on her strength, and that she was his world, but that he had survived it when she too passed away a couplel of years back, and he’d realized life does, indeed go on. He knew the pediatrician who had cared for our first son (also named Benjamin) when he was born.  He also told me that our doctor had scheduled his surgery for the same day as mine, and that he had chatted with him in the doctor’s lounge only that  morning. When the nurse called my name, and I got ready to get up, I realized that he had held my hand the whole time we were talking.

A week later, at my follow-up appointment, I asked our doctor how Dr. McDaniel’s surgery had gone.  The surgeon said “Who?”  I said, “Dr. McDaniel, you did his surgery the same day as mine.  He went to the nursing home afterward,   he chatted with you in the doctors lounge a couple of days before…… The surgeon’s response:  “Never heard of him”.

Now,  I was at one time an outpatient surgical RN.  I know this for certain:  a doctor does not do surgery on another doctor and not remember every single aspect of that doctor’s case.  I left scratching my head that day, and wondering if maybe, just maybe, I had entertained “angels unaware”.  In fact there had been several other aspects of that pre-op test morning that were striking.  First off, I love to hear a bell choir.  When I had walked into the cavernous lobby of the hospital that December morning, I was greeted by the beautiful sound of Christmas carols played on the bells.  Also, when I had asked about seeing the anesthesiologist to discuss my fears about anesthesia with narcolepsy, the nurses had looked at the name and got dubious expressions, and one said, we will page and see if we can get him up here, but sometimes they are just too tied up to come.  But the doctor had come right away, and had pulled up a chair like he had all the time in the world.  When I told him I was worried about the anesthesia risks with Narcolepsy, he told me that he does it all the time, and he addressed my every concern, and even said, “Is there anything else I can do for you?”  When I said no, he shook my hand, patted me on the shoulder, looked me in the eye and said “don’t worry about a thing, you are in good hands”, then he left.  When I looked at the nurses, they were both standing there with their mouthes hanging open, and one said “I don’t know who you are, but we have NEVER been able to get that doctor to come up here to talk with a patient!”  And then later, when there was some missing records that were still needed for my pre-op file and had not been obtained, despite several calls on my part, I happened to know where my doctor’s nurse had gone after my class, (she was giving an in service on some new equipment” so I went in search of her, and not only did she jump on the phone and make a few stern calls on my behalf, she also gave me her personal number and told me to call her again if I had questions and needed anything.

And on the day of the surgery, after all that, I was totally at peace, and get this:  Usually I am an easy stick, but 6 nurses could not get my IV started, so the Nurse Anesthetist came in to do it.  She sent everyone else out of the cubicle and she spoke to me in low tones and said “I have never met another nurse who has narcolepsy.  I have it too, but I don’t tell anyone around here for fear they might think I can’t do my job”.   I can’t think of anyone I would want handling my anesthesia than another human being who has lived narcolepsy and would recognize right away if something narcolepsy-related was going on!

Isn’t God amazing?

Life In A Small Town Ain’t What It Used To Be!

This is a true story that happened to me about a year and a half ago.  I pulled up in front of my house after a quick market-run, to find an old pickup truck parked in the space in front of my house where my husband usually parks when he is home.  There was a man sitting in it, and at first I figured he was probably visiting the neighbor across the street.  But he just sat there.  I sat there for a minute, knowing that if he was up to no good, I was probably safer in the car, or maybe even should drive on over to the neighbors.  The longer he sat there, the more I got a little irritated.  So finally, leaving my groceries so as not to have my hands full, I grabbed my keys and mace, and got out.  I purposely turned and took a long look at his plates, then looked him in the eye and went on into my house.  I set my alarm, and grabbed the phone and called my neighbor to tell her what was going on and told her that if I have to hang up, she should call 911.   I continued to watch him, as he blatantly continued to watch my house.  But I didn’t get really nervous, until he got out of the truck and started walking toward my front yard.  That was when I got my gun.     I watched him walk through my side yard around to the back, and as he passed behind the garage and got near my gate.  That was when I decided that if he was coming in the back, I was going out the front.  Phone in one hand, gun in the other, I exited through the front door, activating our loud security alarm.   So there I was in front with my phone and gun and I realized that the only thing I could do now was try to know where the guy was, I mean, for heaven sakes, its broad daylight, what’s he going to do to me out here, I’m thinking.  So I follow the path he had gone, around my house, toward the alley, and he is nowhere to be seen.  I see that my back door is intact, as the police arrive and I tell them everything.  There were 2 squad cars, and they drove all around but could not find the guy.  Ran his plates and they came back registered 2 counties away.  Finally the police leave me to fend for myself, and I go back in and lock my doors and reset my alarm.  Well, a few minutes later I see this other guy walking around looking at my house, wearing a hoodie and talking on his cell phone.  I stepped out on my locked porch and looked him straight in the eye as well.  And then he goes the same direction the other guy went.  Lo and behold, next I see guy number 1 come back to his truck.  By then I am mad as a hornet.  Mad the police left, and madder at this dude, so with my gun tucked in my pocket (I have a legal concealed carry certificate), I went out and confronted this jerk, demanding to know what he was doing on my property and watching my house.  He gave some lame excuse of having gone to see his friend on the other street.  I told him it was a stupid thing to do,  and a good way to get himself shot!  I also told him the police had been here, and ran his plates.  Then I went back in the house and watched as he climbed into the bed of his truck and hid something in the toolbox, and then got back in and drove away.  I had a very good look at his face as I had stood yelling at him and the next night I saw that face again….on the evening news, shot dead in an attempted home invasion by a frightened teen home alone. The second guy was pictured as well, and was wounded in the shooting, but captured when he went to the ER.   In speaking to another neighbor a few days later, I learned a man fitting the same description, had tried to assault her as she cleaned an empty house down the alley from me, in preparation for the new tenants, and had blatantly told her what he intended to do to her. Prior to that she had noticed him and a younger companion, repeatedly driving by, but she figured they were looking at the old appliances sitting on the walk out front for pickup.  She is a former pro-boxer and a tough biker-chick, so her resistance caught him off guard when he came at her, and when a neighbor had come to check on all the ruckus, the man had left.  Putting it all together, we came to the conclusion that he was the same man whom I had seen, through my kitchen window, standing in the alley behind that house, and he had been watching her and had calculated the move,  just like he had watched my house a few days later.   The experts always say that you should trust your intuition.  My intuition that day, was that if he had ill-intentions toward me and my house, cowering in the car was only going to project fear.  So I opted for standing my ground initially, then not being a sitting duck if he was coming in.  It all happened in a matter of moments, even the police coming and leaving.  The second guy was apparently the look-out.  Confronting is always a risk, but  I am glad that I handled it the way that I did, because I have a feeling that had I not triggered the alarm, I would have been the one to have to have shot him, and that is not on my bucket list of things to do in this lifetime.

 

A Basket Of Water

The story is told of an old man who lived on a farm in the mountains of Eastern Kentucky with his young grandson.  Each morning, Grandpa was up early sitting at the kitchen table reading from his old worn-out Bible  His grandson, who wanted to be just like him, tried to imitate him in any way he could.

One day the grandson asked, “Papa, I try to read the Bible just like you but I don’t understand it, and what I do understand, I forget as soon as I close the book.  What good does reading the Bible do?”

The grandfather quietly turned from putting coal in the stove and said, “Take this coal basket down to the river and bring back a basket of water”.

The boy did as he was told, though all the water leaked out before he could get back to the house.  The grandfather laughed and said, “you will have to move a little faster next time,” and sent him back to the river with the basket to try again.  This time the boy ran faster, but again the basket was empty before he returned home.  Out of breath, he told his grandfather that it was “impossible to carry water in a basket” and he went to get the bucket instead.

The old man said, “I don’t want a bucket of water; I want a basket of water.  You can do this.  You’re just not trying hard enough,” and he went out the door to watch the boy try again.  At this point, the boy knew it was impossible, but he wanted to show his grandfather that even if he ran as fast as he could, the water would leak out before he got far at all.  The boy scooped the water and ran hard, but when he reached his grandfather the basket was again empty.  Out of breath, he said, “See Papa, it’s useless”.

“So you think it is useless?”  The old man said “Look at the basket”.  The boy looked at the basket and for the first time he realized that the basket looked different.  Instead of a dirty old coal bucket, it was clean.  “Son, that’s what happens when you read the Bible.  You might not understand or remember everything, but when you read it, it will change you from the inside out.  That is the work of God in our lives:  To change us from the inside out and to slowly transform us into the image of His son.”

Take time to read a portion of God’s word each day.  It does a body good!

Author Unknown-distributed by e-mail