A Thankful Heart

Katherine insisted that I come home (to Georgia) for Thanksgiving.

It has long been one of my favorite holidays. Christmas is ridiculous these days. It makes my head hurt. But the capitalists have never quite figured out how to capitalize on quaint little pious people with funny hats, collars, and shoe buckles. I guess the whole concept of “giving thanks” is somewhat alien to Madison Avenue anyway. It doesn’t come naturally to any of us.

I’m trying to teach James to say “please” and “thank you.” Of course it is usually during a feeding time. As he is twisting, bouncing, pointing, and grunting for MORE, even with a full mouth, I slowly refill the spoon and tell him to say, “Please, Mimi.” Then, once I plop the bite in his mouth, I say “Thank you.” (Actually, I say it the way a baby would...“tank-tu”...sorry, Purists.) He is completely clueless. What do these words have to do with the Divine Right of Kings (and other small tyrants) to be FED? That is our first perceived need, and we demand that it be met right there on the delivery table. HOW DARE YOU NOT FEED ME IMMEDIATELY??? I DIDN’T ASK TO BE BORN, BUT SINCE I’M HERE, YOU’D BETTER SNAP TO IT!

We carry much of that “entitlement attitude” into adulthood. Especially in this country. We have our inalienable rights! We want what we want, and we deserve to get it! At a very young age, a child learns all about “me” and “mine.”

Sometimes it’s hard to be grateful for that which we consider a right, not a privilege. Human beings being as we are, I think it’s (unfortunately) necessary for us to live through some loss in order to develop a truly thankful heart.

Like it says in the song, “Don’t it always seem to go, that you don’t know what you’ve got til it’s gone...”

***************

Being home, the New Reality seems like a dream.

When I arrived, my sweet husband had the house completely decked out with all of our old Thanksgiving stuff. Fresh flowers are everywhere, aromatic fall candles glow, a cozy fire burns in the family room. Even though everything about our lives has changed, it seems the same here. The halls are lined with pictures; every chest of drawers is covered with them. A relative refers to the stairwell descending to the basement as our “Wall of Fame.” All of my girls’ corny Olan Mills school pics are there, vying for space with high school and college honors. There is Katherine beaming beatifically at age 4. Awkward at 10. Aglow with life at 16, holding flowers. Gorgeous at 20, wearing crowns. Smiling, smiling, smiling, smiling...

There was so much to smile about.

Who knew that a smile could become such a rare and desperately-sought-after treasure?


I’m not going to beat myself up about having been so disgustingly unappreciative of the wonderfully good times of the past.

I can still conjure them up in my mind and savor them like a delicious meal. I can sneak back and take a peek into my grandmother’s fragrant house packed with 50 people for Thanksgiving lunch. Every surface laden with decadent dishes...uncles arguing over football in the den...kids playing football in the backyard...the women laboring over one last preparation for the feast...and the children, dressed up like Pilgrims and Indians, getting ready to sing for us. Katherine, as the first great-grand, was always the director of the motley little choir. “Come, ye thankful people come...” they sang, as feathers bobbed and collars slipped.

The irony is that when the blessings are bountiful, we tend to take them for granted. But through the telescope of change and loss, we are enabled to see them as the gold they always were. Then, finally, comes a rich, warm flood of gratitude. Since God exists outside of time and space, I like to think that retro-thanks pleases him as much as timely thanks.

I am more aware than ever that nothing here lasts.

Now the joys are sweeter than before. The peace is deeper. The gratitude is greater. I have never had so many reasons to be thankful. What could possibly be greater than the gift of a life?

But there are still reasons to be sad. That happy, smiling little girl of mine will not be eating her third piece of chocolate pecan pie today. Her Thanksgiving feast will be delivered via a tube in her abdomen. She will not be running around the house making the party happen. She will be sitting in a chair struggling to communicate, while the party flows around her.

I wish God would fix her today. But even if He doesn’t, I am going to thank and praise Him anyway. And in doing that, I will be offering Him a feast on Thanksgiving Day. I believe that the thanksgiving offered out of our places of sorrow is especially sweet to Him. “For here we do not have an enduring city, but we are looking for the city that is to come. Through Jesus, therefore, let us continually offer to God a sacrifice of praise—the fruit of lips that confess his name. And do not forget to do good and to share with others, for with such sacrifices God is pleased.” (Hebrews 13:14-16)

I will choose to praise Him in the storm.


On this day of thanksgiving, may you know how very deeply you are loved.

It is my prayer that each of us will be enabled to receive the gift of a truly thankful heart.......even before the next earthly loss comes.

Because it will.

God bless us, everyone.

**************

“Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, let us be thankful, and so worship God acceptably with reverence and awe." (Hebrews 12:28)

“And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity. Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, since as members of one body you were called to peace. And be thankful. Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom, and as you sing psalms, hymns and spiritual songs with gratitude in your hearts to God.” (Colossians 3:14-16)


Now thank we all our God,
with heart and hands and voices,
who wondrous things has done,
in whom this world rejoices;
who from our mothers' arms
has blessed us on our way
with countless gifts of love,
and still is ours today.

O may this bounteous God
through all our life be near us,
with ever joyful hearts
and blessed peace to cheer us;
and keep us still in grace,
and guide us when perplexed;
and free us from all ills,
in this world and the next.

All praise and thanks to God
the Father now be given;
the Son, and him who reigns
with them in highest heaven;
the one eternal God,
whom earth and heaven adore;
for thus it was, is now,
and shall be evermore.
(Martin Rinckart, 1663)

The Next Right Thing

Okay, so now there’s all this pressure to say something Meaningful and Profound.

Sorry, but don’t expect consistency in that department here.

Sometimes the best thing you can do is just show up.

Period.


When every fiber of your being is screaming, “NO, NO, NO!”........ you still make an appearance.

And that is enough.

The grace is sufficient.


A beautiful, old, battered friend of mine once told me, “Kim, you just do the next right thing.”

No matter what.

Do the next right thing.


Don’t look down, or you’ll drown.

Do it even if no one’s watching:

THE

NEXT

RIGHT

THING.


That is all.


Really.

A Day In The Life...

6:00 a.m.-Loud gibberish on the baby monitor
6:30- Loud crying...Granny gets up
6:32- Change diaper
6:35- Watch Baby Einstein (aka “Baby Crack”)
7:00- Fry egg with screaming baby on hip
7:05- Feed baby egg, oatmeal, and cheerios
7:30- Wrestle baby to ground and dress him
8:00- Help his mom finish getting ready
8:45- Wave byebye
9:00- Play with toys, read books, watch more Baby Crack
10:00- Put baby down for morning nap
10:05- Collapse on sofa, check email
10:25- Straighten house up
11:00- Shower, dress
11:50- Baby cries
12:00 p.m.- Fix baby’s lunch: grilled cheese, banana, string cheese, peach, milk
12:10- Wash breakfast dishes
12:15- Daddy and Mommy back from rehab
12:30- Eat lunch
1:00- Go to “grocery store” recommended by son-in-law
2:00- Go to real grocery store to find missing items
3:00- Unload groceries
3:30- Prepare to take quick nap
3:35- Baby wakes up from 2nd nap
3:40- Play with baby while everyone else takes a nap
3:45- Try to convince baby to play nightnight; play horsie instead
4:30- Resort to more Baby Crack
5:00- Change 6-wipe stinky diaper
5:15- Bathe baby
6:30- Feed baby supper
7:15- Baby goes nightnight
7:30- Fix grownup’s supper
8:15- Eat supper
8:30- Watch tube
9:30- Wash dishes
10:00- Baby wakes up and cries
10:10- Pat baby back to sleep
11:00- Get ready for bed
11:05- Read for 5 minutes
11:10- Go to sleep
12:30 a.m.- Baby screaming
12:35- Change massive diarrhea diaper
12:40- Still screaming
12:45- Walk around living room and 'ticka ticka'* on couch
*(Arnoldese for "tickle," as in a back)
12:50- Fall asleep with baby on couch
1:30- Sneak baby back to bed
1:32- Go back to bed
4:00- Baby screaming
4:05- Stumble around with baby
4:10- Get in bed with baby and 'ticka ticka'
6:30- Wake up with baby’s finger in eye
6:31- Praise God, from whom all blessings flow
6:32- Kiss baby all over his beautiful snotty face

7:00 a.m.- Fry egg with screaming baby on hip...

Jesus and Bridget Jones

I have something to confess...

I absolutely adore “Bridget Jones' Diary.”

Yes, I know it’s raunchy and silly. I know it contains gratuitous sex and foul language.

Still, it remains one of my all-time favorite tragi-comedies.

One of my kids got this the other night. She and her sister were watching it on the tube in LA, while I was back in Athens doing fun things like voting, getting a flu shot (hear that, Mother?), and a mammogram. That particular daughter and I had exchanged some ‘difficult’ words the night before I left LA, so I was elated to receive the following text (verbatim) from her:

“we’re watchin Bridget jones.....It’s true....I LOVE YOU just as you are. what would i do without you? xoxoxo.”

(Oh, the charming complexities of the mother/daughter relationship!)

But back to Bridget: She is the archetypal Everywoman. (And –man, actually.)

She’s a mess. Bridget sets self-improvement goals which she can’t keep. She makes vows and breaks them. Her daily fare is a foot sandwich, chagrin on the side. Her psyche teeters torturously between delusions of grandeur and abysmally low self-esteem. But even though her best is never quite good enough, she keeps trying. She ‘gets knocked down, but she gets up again.’

She is the secular embodiment of Romans 7. In some ways, I’m a lot like Bridget.

All she really wants in the whole wide world is what we all long for: to be loved just for who we are, warts and all. She wants someone who thinks she’s worth it...someone who believes in her potential whether or not she ever comes close to reaching it. Bridget wants a man willing to fight for her. She wants someone who just wants her, thick or thin. (Pun intended.)

Being a lit-freak, I appreciate author Helen Fielding’s clever transposition of some of the early 19th Century characters (or types) from Pride and Prejudice into 20th Century London. Quite a cultural contrast...yet ‘the more things change, the more they stay the same,’ as the French say.

Just as Elizabeth Bennett is shocked to find true love where she least expects it, so Bridget is obliged to lay aside the prejudice of an initial bad impression and the pride which might force her to cling to it. Faced with a “You can be right, or you can be happy” dilemma, she wisely chooses happiness. (At least for a while.)

The pivotal exchange of dialogue between Bridget and the 20th Century Mr. Darcy:

Mark Darcy: I like you, very much.
Bridget: Ah, apart from the smoking and the drinking, the vulgar mother and... ah, the verbal diarrhea.
Mark Darcy: No, I like you very much. Just as you are.

JUST AS YOU ARE.

And that, my friends, is the bottom line of the Good News.

We are loved just as we are. More than we can possibly imagine.

(...because that kind of love is a rare gift among human beings.)


In the past 6 months, I’ve had the privilege of witnessing this kind of love lived out to the extreme.

***************

A cherubic young man with a boy’s face can’t contain his grin. The sparklingly beautiful bride beams. Handel’s Chorus majestically pours from the church organ, rattling the tall windows of the elegant antebellum structure.

Flash to the reception. It is an absolutely gorgeous day. A too-good-to-be-true Hollywood set day. The November Georgia sky is a brilliant Carolina blue. Heaven’s weather. Delicious breeze. Gorgeous flowers everywhere. Clink of glasses. Tempting aromas. Family. Friends from around the globe. Mellow music outside, rockin’ vibes inside. Uncontainable electric joy ricochets off the columns and floats up into the pale sapphire sky like an escaped balloon.

Laughing and waving wildly, Barbie and Ken are whisked away in a limo to their assured happily-ever-aftering.

The DVD ends.

The mothers of the bride and groom exchange quick glances.

I get up off the sofa and go into the bathroom.

The contrast is so breathtakingly extreme.

***************

I, (name), take you (name), to be my (wife/husband), to have and to hold from this day forward, for better or for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish; from this day forward until death do us part.

***************

But this is not what the boy in the DVD signed up for.

The girl he fell head-over-heels in love with was not the kind of girl who needed a man to hold her up. A young man would consider himself lucky if he could even catch up with her. The girl in the DVD was the kind of girl who inspired songs. The lyrics to a particularly catchy one written in her honor (/at her expense) by a college band included the line, “Hold on, Katherine, you’re movin’ way too fast...” That girl was a mover and shaker. She made things happen.

That beautiful young bride was a force of nature. Heads turned when she entered a room. People listened when she spoke...which was in a loud, clear, articulate voice. She was a passionate, motivating speaker. She was a compassionate, empathizing friend. She was the aroma that drew people in, the glue that kept them together.

She seemed to be uniquely blessed. She won awards she didn’t seek, accolades she never expected. She was a “winner.” She provoked intense loyalty in some, envy in others...as those who run outside the pack always do. She was a klutz who won beauty queen titles, a prude who was adored by the frat boys who chose her as their sweetheart. She was loved and respected by professors and given prestigious responsibilities. She was a bright and rising star, with potential reaching to the skies. She had everything the world considers of value...brains, beauty, talent, popularity, ambition...the whole package. And in spite of all that, she was even a nice person.

So she headed to California to pursue her dreams, which seemed easily within her reach.

The young man said, “Whither thou goest, I shall go...”

Little did he know where that would lead them.

***************

They had to cut her wedding ring off in the emergency room.

Last week, for her fourth anniversary, her husband gave her another one. This one is even more beautiful than the original. It is an “eternity” ring....a circle of diamonds set in white gold. The fiery furnace of adversity has unveiled the true gold of eternal, selfless, unconditional love. The diamonds sparkle as a reminder of the secret treasures they’ve found hidden in the darkness. The circle, of course, represents love without end.

The wife is now very altered from how she appeared in the wedding DVD of four years ago. I know that there must be times when her husband misses her as she used to be...the sound of her clear, strong voice...her laugh...her infectious energy...her zest for life...her efficiency at solving problems, her ability to make everything okay. But the love he evidences now seems deeper, stronger, richer than before. There is an amazing gentleness as he takes care of her basic needs. There is actually even joy...as he fills her feeding tube, bandages her damaged eye, wipes her nose, helps her with a shower on onto the toilet....as he cooks and cleans and does the laundry and changes diapers....as he plans 1-year-old birthday parties and fields phone calls and emails and fills out grocery bags full of insurance forms.

I have been greatly moved in witnessing the mature love that has grown out of this seeming tragedy. The boy has become a man of whom I am very proud, and for whom I am extremely grateful. At an age when many of their peers are still ‘not over’ college, the love that Katherine and Jay bear for each other has ripened to a degree that many marriages never attain.

Shortly after Katherine’s surgery, a friend sent me back a present I had given her years ago. At the time, my friend was going through a very dark period and feeling unlovable. She was acting out of her pain. I gave her a silver locket with a line from a Shakespearean sonnet engraved on it to assure her that I still loved her no matter what. Now I have this locket hanging from the lamp next to my bed in LA. It is a wonderful reminder for me. The quote was taken from Sonnet 116:


Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments; love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove.
O no, it is an ever-fixed mark
That looks on tempests and is never shaken;
It is the star to every wand'ring bark,
Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.
Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle's compass come,
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out even to the edge of doom:
If this be error and upon me proved,
I never writ, nor no man ever loved.

William Shakespeare

Oh yes, there have been impediments...and alterations...and terrible tempests in the lives of this young couple.

The love of which Shakespeare writes is a love that remains constant no matter what “alterations” occur in the beloved or in the relationship. But as appealing as this romanticized ideal of courtly love is, I don’t believe it is really possible to love that way unless we have first received and accepted an even greater love ourselves.

In The Four Loves, Lewis introduces the concept of “need-love.” I think the majority of what passes for love in this world falls into that category. ("I love you because you meet my needs in some way"... "I love you because of the way you make me feel"... "I love you because of what you do for me")

But in coming to a more mature and complete understanding of how totally, unconditionally, and sacrificially we are loved by our Creator (and always have been), we are set free from the bondage of our needs. Only then are we are free to love with abandon, and in doing so, we set others free from our expectations. Human beings simply cannot meet each other's deepest needs.

When we allow ourselves to be filled to the brim with the love of God, that inexhaustible love flows out of us in a steady stream. My son-in-law knows that kind of love. That love gets up at midnight to walk his wife to the bathroom or change a stinky diaper. (The baby's, not hers!) That love finds her more beautiful with a crossed eye and a shaking hand than he did on the day he looked into her gorgeous aqua blues and put a ring on her finger. (Plus, he's still just flat out crazy about her, as she is of him.)

I thank God that my 26-year-old son-in-law is so "rooted and established in love, that he has received the power to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that he may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God." (Eph. 3:17-19) And from that place of fullness, he is able to live out Christ's call to love my daughter selflessly, sacrificially, and unconditionally:

"A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another." (John 13:34)


If Bridget had just known Jesus, it might have lasted.....forever.

**************

"Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her..." (Ephesians 5:25)

...And Waiting

Several years ago, our pastor and his wife came to our house to pray for our family. We were living through a period that some might refer to as “Under Attack.” One blow came swiftly on the heels of its predecessor, allowing no time for recovery in between. Unrelenting stress and crisis were the normative conditions during this time. My husband and I were both exhausted, sick, and very close to the end of our ropes. We were shocked and disappointed that God didn’t seem to hear our cries for relief.

After talking for a while, our friends began praying for each of us, moving around the room to place healing hands on us one at a time. When they prayed for me, it was comforting, but I didn’t experience any major ‘bells and whistles.’ Then I sensed them moving around the room towards Katherine. I started getting chills. We heard the prayer momentarily cease as they whispered to each other something like, “Wow, did you get that?” accompanied by sounds of murmured wonderment.

When the prayer was over, our pastor said to Katherine, “I feel that God is singling you out for some special purpose...that you have a 'divine destiny.'" His wife corroborated, saying that she was startled by how strongly that impression had been made upon her as well.

We were slightly weirded out. With my active imagination, it was a pleasant fantasy to picture Katherine giving God the glory from the Academy Awards stage one day. At least it was a little distraction from the chronic pain that pursued me. Unfortunately, the prayer seemed to have had little efficacy for me. But later that evening, my husband, who is not in the least prone to exaggeration, reported a remarkable improvement in some of his physical symptoms. I try to keep an open mind about this kind of thing. “Well, good,” I thought/prayed, “at least he deserves some answered prayer.”

That night was a strange one. We had a terrific winter storm, and the power went out. We stumbled around the house by candlelight, trying to pick through the piles of stuff we’d been going through before the lights turned off. Katherine was scheduled to leave the house at 5:00 a.m. to catch a flight back to California, and her sisters and I had emptied our closets for her to pick through our hand-me-downs. It was chaos in the dark.

We finally gave up in the wee hours, and all crowded into the master bedroom for what little warmth the gas fireplace might provide. Unable to find my pain meds in the dark, and not able to use my heating pad because of the power outage, I ‘slept’ in the bed with my mother while the rest of the family crowded together in sleeping bags. I fitfully dozed off and on for a few hours, assuming that the pain would be so severe in the morning that I would be unable to move.

The next morning, I stumbled into the shower, still half asleep, and began washing my hair. Suddenly, I became aware that I was using both hands. I had not been able to lift my right arm above my head without severe pain for almost a year prior to that. Several health-care professionals had told me that it was likely that I’d never have another pain-free day, but we would learn how to “manage” it.

I was miraculously pain-free for the rest of the day. Although the battle was not completely over at that time, my pain level remained greatly diminished for months afterwards. (So much for bells and whistles.)

I began taking those spiritually-intuited words about Katherine more seriously, wondering if they actually might prove to be prophetic in some way.

What could God possibly have in store for her?


Obviously, it was nothing we could imagine.

***************

...And so we continue to await the unfolding of His plan, remembering that “His ways are not our ways, His thoughts are not our thoughts...”

The Waiting Room is not a new place for me...I’ve signed my name in here a few times before. So while I wait to be called back to the examining room, I thumb through the stack of old stories on the table to assuage my apprehension.

I start with the Big Daddy, Abraham. He always makes me feel a little better. (The whole Ishmael thing... pimping his wife not once, but twice...laughing at the angel...!!) According to my calculations, it was 25 years between the Promise and its fulfillment. Twenty five years of believing, doubting, trying, failing, trying again. And just when it seemed completely impossible, The Blessing came.

Then I look at Joseph. Oh, the arrogance of youth! We’re just so cocky until we get the stuffing knocked out of us a few times. I cringe at the remembrance of what a know-it-all I was in my teens and twenties. Maybe young Joseph was just impulsive and lacking in some social skills. Nobody likes a braggart. But it wasn’t all his fault that he was spoiled; parents should never have favorites. He had plenty of time to think about his own mistakes, however, in the 20+ years he awaited the fulfillment of his dream. Years of betrayal, imprisonment, false accusations, broken promises. His character was purged through the fires of burning disappointment until he was a man big enough to forgive the unforgiveable...a man worthy of being a prototype of the One who “blessed those who cursed him.”

Moses: From the decadent palaces of Egypt to the obscurity of the boondocks. Feeling like a pauper instead of a prince, he languished for 40 years of exile in Midian before reluctantly receiving the Call for liberation.

And then there’s Saul. I used to be under the impression that after his moment of enlightenment, when the scales fell off his eyes, he took off running to spread the News. But no. In “The Conversion of Saul,” Robert Deffinbaugh writes, “There may well have been a long time between Saul’s conversion and his arrival at Jerusalem.” In Galatians, Paul (formerlyknownas Saul) tells us that he did not go directly to Jerusalem to connect with his new brothers, as would be expected. Instead, he went away to Arabia and then returned to Damascus. It was over three years before went to Jerusalem and finally met Peter. First he went into the desert. Then he revisited the place where his life had been turned upside down. As driven and Type A as he was, Saul had to wait humbly until he had learned what he needed to learn. I’m sure he was chomping at the bit as the wild horses of his fiery, impulsive nature were being tamed. Snorting and pawing at the starting line, he learned the hard lessons of obedience and submission. And the even harder one of surrendering his will and plans.

Later, after much character growth, he would write, “...we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us. You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly. Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous man, though for a good man someone might possibly dare to die. But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us." (Romans 5:3-8)

At just the right time, God’s plan and purposes for Katherine will unfold.

As they will for all of us who wait.

***************

This is what the Lord says:
“At just the right time, I will respond to you.
On the day of salvation I will help you...
Through you I will reestablish the land of Israel
and assign it to its own people again.
I will say to the prisoners, ‘Come out in freedom,’
and to those in darkness, ‘Come into the light.’
They will be my sheep, grazing in green pastures
and on hills that were previously bare.
They will neither hunger nor thirst.
The searing sun will not reach them anymore.
For the Lord in his mercy will lead them;
he will lead them beside cool waters.
And I will make my mountains into level paths for them.
The highways will be raised above the valleys.
See, my people will return from far away...”
(Isaiah 49:8-12)


The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness to mean...
(II Peter 3:9)

Hunger

Few of us really know what hunger is.

I eat all day long. I am hypoglycemic, so if I don’t eat something every three or four hours, I get shaky and mean. You don’t want to get near me around 4:00 or 5:00 in the afternoon if I haven’t had access to a snack.

I imagine that, for most who are reading this, hunger is what happens when you’re on a self-imposed diet or if you’re on the freeway too long without a McDonald’s stop.

A lot of my new neighbors in Westwood are really hungry. Hungry, as in they have no idea where the next meal is coming from unless it's out of a dumpster. Being LA’s college town, the community probably won’t let them starve. But it gets old...and sad...sometimes, passing out dollar bills every time you have to run to the drug store. (We actually WALK to ‘run’ errands here...like living in Europe.)

Yes, I know all the reasons why we’re not supposed to do that. I know there are shelters and soup kitchens. All I can tell you is that if they have to ask, they need it more than I do. I remember a story about CSL being challenged by one of his colleagues on the topic one time. His response was something like, “Yes, I know he’ll probably just spend it on drink. But if I keep it, I might just spend it on drink!” We’re all really beggars on one level or another.

What do we actually own?

My mother was the type that would stop and help hitchhikers out in the 60’s. (No, come to think of it, she wasn’t the ‘type’ at all. But she did it.) Sometimes she would give them a ride. My father always called the State Patrol and the emergency room when she was late coming back from Atlanta. It never deterred her in the least. If someone were hungry, she made sure they were fed.

The worst trip of Katherine’s life was when we took her to New York for her 12th birthday. We thought she’d love it, as besotted with “The Theater” as she was. But all the fabulous plays in the world couldn’t make up for the grief she felt over the hungry, homeless people. She was in tears walking down the sidewalks of The City. Brooks finally got a stack of dollar bills and we let her hand them out all day long. The inequity of poverty overwhelmed her. (And no, it doesn’t matter to any of us if it’s their own damn fault they’re on the streets. Call us suckers. They are still worthy of compassion.)

Although Katherine loved going on a mission trip to Malawi with her father-in-law’s church, the relentless NEED saddened her. She told me, “We’d work all day long, as efficiently as we could, but we never got to the end of the line.” Being forced to turn some away was devastating to her. How desperately she wanted to ease their pain, satisfy their hunger, help to heal their sicknesses.

It is sadly ironic that Katherine has to suffer such gnawing hunger herself now.

Eating is one of our family’s greatest passions. My two oldest children were born ravenous. They nursed all day (and night) long. When they were James’ age, they would scream when the breakfast oatmeal ran out. Katherine averaged 3 bowls per morning. I was in a major health-food phase at the time, so the Arnold girls weren’t allowed to have white sugar, processed food, any of the bad stuff. It backfired. Forbidden fruit is always sweeter.

Much later, countless friends and neighbors laughingly told me about having to make special grocery store runs when the Arnold girls were coming over. They were particularly notorious for cleaning out cookie drawers and candy bowls. No one could believe how much those cute little girls could pack down. I have to confess that I set a bad example for them. I was a low birth weight baby and a skinny (hyperactive) child who was wildly applauded for eating. I also inherited a very high metabolism. (At least until things ‘change’d.....get it, ladies?) As an adult, I have achieved a certain level of fame for how much I can eat. The girls, wanting to be just like Mommy, thought it was great fun to eat a lot. I am 5’3” and fairly lazy. My husband is 6’6” and a very self-disciplined runner. Our girls and I have always eaten more (and much worse) than he does...which was fine for them until the vertical growth stopped. They don’t thank me so much anymore.

Anyway, I think it’s interesting to note how many celebrations and ceremonies are centered around food. Every Southern family get-together is a moveable feast. My mother’s mother was a wonderful old-fashioned cook, who always had something on the stove ‘just in case’ someone happened to stop by. She had six grown children who frequently did, along with their spouses, children, friends, pets, and strays. We celebrated almost every holiday at her big, old, white house on a hill in Gainesville, Georgia...sometimes as many as 50 of us for Thanksgiving dinner. Nenie would cook at least 10 dishes for every occasion, but then everyone else would bring two or three to add to the banquet. Just writing about it conjures up intoxicating smells which are starting to make me salivate.

I’ll be back after I run to the kitchen......

Food is an instrument of love. I’ve written before (and I will write again some day) of the flow of fabulous food that showered down on us while we were at UCLA. I learned many lessons from it. Literally hundreds of people went to great trouble to keep us well-fed. Mothers of small children took hours out of their busy days to provide us with wonderful meals. They would struggle in, pushing a stroller with one hand while carrying heavy bags of food and holding a toddler’s hand with the other. This was after a long search for a parking space, followed by a long hike to the hospital and a long trek down miles of hall looking for us. It was a great sacrifice of love.

By the time Katherine got down to Acute Rehab from ICU, she was fully aware of this food offering. Her sense of smell (atypically) remained intact, and she was tormented by the aromas drifting down the halls. As she grew more aware of her situation, she, strangely, became hungrier and thirstier by the day, even though she was receiving adequate caloric intake from the nasty beigey-gray substance given through a feeding tube in her stomach. I have since read that an acute sense of hunger can be one physiological/psychological side effect of a brain injury.

At first, Katherine could not tolerate the sight of a drink or any food in her room, so we discreetly wolfed (no pun intended) down the generous meals in the privacy of the staff kitchen or lunchroom. But she would get lonely even for those brief periods. Knowing how I have to eat or get loopy, she started encouraging me to eat in the room with her. I would sit just feet away from her, but with the curtain drawn between us so she didn’t have to watch. Eventually we did away with that. As she wistfully glanced at me choking down my sandwich, I would assure her that it wasn’t very good (even if it was delicious) and that she wasn’t missing anything. But of course that is exactly what she was doing...missing one of the old loves of her life.

To this day, Katherine’s nagging hunger remains. It haunts her day and night.

She told me that if she could only do one again, she would pick eating over walking.

Still, Katherine chooses to join us for most meals now. She is a “people person” above all else. She exercises self-discipline of the most stringent type by calmly sitting there while we satiate ourselves. It’s got to be terrific torture. She is learning volumes about the practice of the spiritual disciplines. On a daily basis, she chooses to be a part of the fellowship breaking bread together, in spite of the personal sacrifice. But sometimes she is very quiet.

It hurts me as a mother. From the time we first hooked up on the delivery table, feeding my child has been the most instinctual of job descriptions. So I’ve often wondered about the purpose of this imposed fast. I believe it might be in the category of “sharing in the sufferings.” Once, I reminded her of Christ’s fast during the temptation. “Yes, but that was only 40 days,” she countered. Jay said, “Well, Katherine, I guess you’ve got Jesus beat.” Of course no sacrilege was intended...that was in the “might as well laugh” category. (We did.) Still, the mysteries remain....

I’ve been thinking a lot about hunger these days. One of Webster’s definitions for the infinitive “To hunger” is: Have a craving, appetite, or great desire for.

Dear God, we’re all hungry for something.

I tried going without food for a while the day I wrote most of this blog. What I felt was a relentless, nagging need. Want. Desire. An emptiness that desperately needed filling.

This may be a wild stretch, but just maybe, like Hosea, God is allowing Katherine the privilege of suffering as an example to the rest of us.

Maybe He’s using her to remind us all that we’re desperately needy for some food and drink that last. In a land of over-saturation, we’re suffering from spiritual malnutrition of the most insidious kind.

And maybe I’m supposed to be reminded of my own spiritual poverty when I connect with those beggars in Westwood. I am in no way above them.

We are family.

As we enter this holiday (Holy Day?) time of celebration, perhaps we should challenge each other to develop an increased awareness of the intense Hunger all around us.

As Dostoyevsky said, “If an onion is all you have, give an onion!”

GIVE AN ONION!!!

An onion of love, an onion of hope...


(CHRISTIANITY: One beggar telling another where the food line starts.)

***************

You are my Shepherd, I'm Your little lamb
You lead me to the still water here in the pastureland
Sometimes I willfully wander
that's when I stumble and fall.

I hunger and thirst for mercy
I hunger and thirst for Your name
If I hunger and thirst for anything but You
I hunger and thirst in vain.

You are my Father,
I'm Your little child
You make a place at Your table
and ask me to stay awhile
I want to stay in Your presence
I want to feast in Your hall.

I hunger and thirst for mercy
I hunger and thirst for Your name
If I hunger and thirst for anything but You
I hunger and thirst in vain...

(Susan Ashton, "Hunger and Thirst" from Angels of Mercy)

***************

"They will neither hunger nor thirst...He who has compassion on them will guide them and lead them beside springs of water." (Isaiah 49:10)

"You still the hunger of those you cherish..." (Psalm 17:14)

"Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled." (Matthew 5:6)

"Blessed are you who hunger now, for you will be satisfied. Blessed are you who weep now, for you will laugh." (Luke 6:21)

"Never again will they hunger; never again will they thirst." (Revelation 7:16)

Plans

Yesterday was my grandson’s first birthday.

What a year it’s been.

Although we’re planning a party for him next week, of course we had to have a little family celebration on the actual day. He smeared cupcake icing all over his face like a good little boy so that his Daddy’s daddy and his Mommy’s mommy could take lots of silly pictures. Then we put him on a blanket in the back yard to open presents, which were stuffed animals he didn’t love and clothes he was bored with. After that, he got fussy. (He’s got a bad cold.)

While his aunt Sarah and his granddaddy tried to entertain him, James’ mother and I sat in the backyard swing and watched as the sun illuminated the mountains on its way out. We rocked gently in the blessedly cool twilight, letting Jay clean up the mess. Katherine was quiet, exhausted and hoarse from fighting to be understood all day. I knew she was sad about having to be an observer rather than an active participant in the proceedings. As a tear dripped out of her left eye, she whispered to me, “This isn’t how I planned it, Mom.”

No kidding.

Katherine is a planner. A MAJOR planner. As an adult, it has frustrated her that I am not. She has things mapped out a year in advance, unlike her mother, who usually flies by the seat of her pants.

I reached over and hugged her head. “I know,” I said, “But God has a plan.” It felt weak and trite coming out, as so many condoling words do. I followed it by reminding her of all the good that’s coming out of her pain....how so many people are being encouraged by her story...yada, yada, yada. “Yes, but what about James?” she asked. I understood her completely without her having to spell it out. As compassionate and caring as Katherine innately is, her love and concern for her own firstborn child trump every other consideration. I know that she is honored that God is using her circumstances in mysterious ways as a blessing for others...BUT WHAT ABOUT HER BABY???

I know how I’d feel if I were her. I’m not nearly as selfless as Katherine is. I’d probably be having a fit. I’d be screaming and crying to God, “Well, it’s great that all these people are being blessed, but does it have to be at my child’s expense??? A child needs his mother to hold his hands while he’s trying to walk! A child needs his mother to pick him up when he’s crying! A little boy needs his mother to get down on the floor and play with him! What about my baby??? Is he going to be okay with all of this? Is he going to be scarred for life?”

We looked up and saw James silhouetted against the silver sky, sitting high on the shoulders of his grandfather. “He’s doing great, Katherine,” I said. “Just look at him.” She sniffed and nodded and made the “Ouuuuh...Cute” face. “He is,” she agreed. I started carefully wiping her tears away. “They only come out of my left eye,” she reminded me. “The right one doesn’t work.” But as I leaned over, I saw a little one dangling off her right eyelashes, sparkling in the dark.

************

Many are the plans in a man's heart, but it is the LORD's purpose that prevails. (Proverbs 19:21)

But the plans of the LORD stand firm forever, the purposes of His heart through all generations. (Psalm 33:11)

In Him we were also chosen, having been predestined according to the plan of Him who works out everything in conformity with the purpose of his will. (Ephesians 1:11)

...and best of all,

“For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the LORD, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.” (Jeremiah 29:11)

WOW

WOW WOW WOW

For once, I’m almost speechless.

(God forbid.)

You guys are incredible. Thank you SO much for your love, support, encouragement, affirmation...and for the confirmation that I am supposed to be doing this.

Obviously, this is about a lot more than what my family is going through. I am honored and amazed that God is using our pain to bring healing to others. You can’t know what a blessing and privilege that is. I appreciate those of you who have opened yourselves up and risked “public exposure” by your comments. It helps to know more about those who have chosen to share this rough journey with us. I realize that we are certainly not alone in facing heartbreak. Please know that I will be praying for those who have shared their own hurts and challenges. We are one body. When the pinkie hurts, the whole hand throbs with pain...and the arm, and the.......

************

Typical me: When I first had a chance to read the comments, my initial thought was, “Whoa...now I really gotta fly right!”

I got an immediate jolt of Spirit fire: “No, Kim...” He said, “All you really gotta do is be loved.”


I mean, how can anyone resist Him???

The good news is too good to be true...but it is.

No strings attached...

“Come one, come all, to the ugly bug ball!”


(...If I’m dreaming, don’t wake me up
If I’m crazy, I don’t wanna be sane
When I’m empty, you fill up my cup
When I’m hurting, you bear my pain...)

************

*A couple of clarifications about the previous blog:

The comment in question was verbal, not written. Please note that I said it was “somewhat” negative. It was not a scathing indictment. Hopefully, the person that made it doesn’t even realize that it provoked such commentary. As “tami” commented, my post was not intended to “rally the troops” in support of the blog. I must confess, however, that it was precious to discover that I have so many willing defenders. I need all the help I can get!

The point is....the 'negative' comment reinforced reservations I have had myself, and forced me to really examine my motives and revisit the risks involved. I also felt that I needed to provide a little background information for those who are late to the dance.

The responses serve as a sign that the blessings far outweigh the curses. Thank you for giving me some peace.

Also, in rereading the post, I remembered that the words to the Jill Phillips song (“God Believes In You”) are“Everything matters if anything matters at all...”

I do believe that’s true.

Love,
Kim

Public Exposure

(*WARNING: Do not read this unless you have nothing else to do. It is self-indulgently long and contains little pertinent information about Katherine’s condition. If you choose to read it anyway, you will understand why I got those teacher’s comments in second grade.)

***************

Recently, I got my first somewhat negative comment about the blog from someone other than a family member. Victim of low self-esteem that I am, I instantly went into a spiral of self-doubt. WHY AM I DOING THIS???

I am from a background that doesn’t quite approve of public exposure. It is with pride that many of my compatriots quote, “Grandmother always said you should only appear in the paper twice... at birth and at death.” Weddings are a fairly recent (20th Century) concession. My sweet mother, who is a young 81, suggested soon after Kelly started it that we needed to “Get off that Caringbridge Thing so someone else can have a turn.” It simply is not considered genteel to put one’s self forward, demand attention, expose one’s private business.

So, WHY AM I DOING THIS???

First of all, I need to tell you that I’ve never really written anything before except for some bad poetry and inappropriate letters to people like my daughters’ ex-boyfriends. Although I’ve taught high school English, I was not an English major in college. I think most of us who love to read harbor secret fantasies about writing, however, and I am no exception. I just never got around to it. If someone asked me to write an Advent devotion for the Church newsletter, I’d be paralyzed by “writer’s block” and would agonize until well past the deadline over what to say. I’d write a sentence, change a word, change another word, and finally scratch out the whole sentence. I would read the entire thing over again each time I finally did manage to tack a new sentence on to it. It would be a lengthy, labored process.

Talking has never been a problem, however. My grandmother was one of five sisters named Converse, and that is what they did...wonderfully well. I grew up listening to their highly descriptive, endless, epic stories. My father, who was half Converse, was also a remarkable raconteur. As a child, I drifted off many nights to his amazingly realistic sound-effects of WWII missiles exploding over Germany as he scurried from foxhole to foxhole.

Evidently, the legacy of excessive verbiage has passed on to me as well. In elementary school, I would get straight A’s in everything except for “Citizenship.” (Okay, not always in Math, either.) The mean teachers would give me a “B” in that box and write, “Talks too much with other students” in the comment space. The nice ones understood and let it slide. And I told stories, too, weaving dramatic sagas in the ‘cloakrooms’ of my old elementary school whenever the class was left unattended. Some of my baby cousins claim that they are still receiving therapy for the ghost stories I told them in the dark closets of my other grandmother’s rambling century-old white house.

Words stream through my mind in a constant flow, usually so fast that I can’t catch them. I know I don’t catch the best ones...I’m not quick enough. I’ve always been fascinated by words, and I believe there is great power in them. THE Word spoke Creation into existence, and we enter into the creative process with our words as well. Human words are a pale substitute, however, for the intimate heart communion that one day will render them unnecessary and meaningless. In the meantime, we struggle to share our stories, our experiences, our hearts. It seems to me that communication is one of the main reasons we’re here: to commune with one another...to share communion. In the movie “Shadowlands,” a former student tells C. S. Lewis, “We read to know we’re not alone.” Words are tools we use to share the human experience.

I’ve found that the written word is sometimes easier than the spoken. The fear, self-consciousness, and possibility of misinterpretation that may be obstacles in spoken communication disappear in writing. For several years preceding Katherine’s AVM rupture, I felt as if I were speaking a foreign language that no one could understand. In a place of terrific physical (and emotional) pain, I retreated into isolation. Some of what I was experiencing was simply not articulable, so I gave up trying to answer truthfully when people asked me how I was. But this forced me into a new intimacy with God that made the suffering much more than worth it all. For the first time since my 8th grade diary, I began journaling. When I was physically able to write, I talked to myself and God on paper, sometimes pouring out words that I couldn’t speak to another living soul. Sometimes He answered back, and I wrote that down, too.

It was all preparation.

The second full day after my arrival in California in April, I lay in my bed at UCLA’s Tiverton House with my grandson asleep beside me and began typing a letter to my friends. Words just poured out onto the electronic page of my laptop...I was talking by typing. In my mind, I was addressing a specific audience of friends who like to know the details. (As do I.) When I got to the hospital that morning, I asked Katherine’s friend Lauren how to send out a group email. After helping me with that, she suggested setting up the blog so other friends, whose addresses were not yet in the new laptop, could also have access. Thus was the blog born.

I wasn’t completely sure what a blog was.

Sometimes it takes my breath away to realize how many people are reading my private thoughts now. I wonder who most of you are. A few have become friends I’ve never met. I am blown away that so many are interested. I can’t allow myself to think about it as I spill my guts (and my family’s) out onto virtual paper in the privacy of my little apartment in LA. But it really gives me something to consider when I’m in Athens and need to make a grocery store run. I might run into someone who’s known me for years, but not really known me at all. Until now.

Guess I’m out of the closet.

In some ways, it’s ironic that I’ve put myself in this position. No one’s kids have been lectured on the Evil Dangers of the Internet as much as mine have. I am sickened by the “Jerry Springer/nasty ‘reality’ TV show/Facebook” need (obsession) we have in this society to expose ourselves to public ridicule at any price. (And voyeuristically to enjoy the negative exposure of others.) I realize that, in some ways, I have entered the realm of that culture I abhor by the use of this vehicle of communication. I acknowledge the many intrinsic risks...and the terrible vulnerability to which they expose us.

For now, I’ve decided that it is worth it.

Early on, when the implications first began to dawn on me, I tacked that "About Me” caveat onto the page in about three minutes while sitting in the noisy lobby at UCLA. I am so glad that I did. It is vitally important to me that anyone reading this understands that I don’t consider myself a “SuperSaint” or an expert on matters spiritual. (Or anything else.) You’ll never catch me running for political office.

But I will tell you this: In the middle of the most paralyzing fear of my life, the words simply began flowing out, unlocked from the self-conscious paralysis of a lifetime. The effortless ease with which they came was supernatural, just another of the many peripheral miracles of that mystical time. In the deepest place in me, I knew that this was what I was being called to do “at such a time as this.”

Later, when a moment of self-doubt first crept in, I prayed about it. This is what I heard reverberating through my spirit: “Just keep it real. Keep it true.”

So, at least for now, I very belatedly welcome you all to this story...Katherine’s story, my story, our story...chapters in the big one. I believe that every single human life is a fascinating story...and each of us has a sacred story to tell, for we are all created in the image of the Creator of the Big Story. All of history is His Story. Our stories are rivulets that flow into the great River of Life itself that surges from the Throne. Every tiny drop is important...every little tear. As Jill Phillips sings, “Everything matters if anything matters at all.”

Because death exists, suffering is universal. In the words of our hometown boys (REM), “Everybody hurts.” Although I’ve heard several comments that writing the blog must be “cathartic” or “therapeutic” for me, I hope it is more than that. It is my prayer that the stories I share from this painful time in the life of my family may in some way help others in their own times of suffering. It is a blessing for Katherine and for those of us who love her to know that her pain is not wasted, but somehow used for good. In turn, we have been richly blessed by the stories others have been brave enough to share with us. For instance, I recently received a beautiful, particularly poignant letter from someone whose sister was killed by an AVM rupture just a few years ago. Strangely enough, the sister’s name was Catherine; she left behind a 2-year old child and a grieving family. In her letter, this precious young woman wrote, “...I would have loved to help her get better, the way you are helping Katherine. How joyous it is to see the pictures of Katherine as she fights to regain strength and mobility. I love seeing James in his mother’s arms. In a way, by seeing Katherine’s progress and seeing all that you all are doing to help her, I can imagine me doing that for my Catherine. Through reading your blogs, I am able to play out, in my mind, the scenario I had envisioned for my sister when she first fell ill, and I thank you for that opportunity, for the peace it gives my soul.” (No, thank you, dear girl. Your story reminds us to be truly thankful for every day, no matter how hard. We will keep you and your family in our prayers.) We bond together in sharing the grief and pain that are inevitable components of life on earth.

In attempting to ‘keep it real and true,’ I realize that what I’ve actually been doing in this sharing of stories is testifying. Webster’s tells me that the stem is the Latin “testis,” witness. Testimony is defined as “firsthand authentication of a fact: EVIDENCE.”

I can tell by a few of the comments I’ve gotten that some of you are in the same place I was in before this happened. Believing, but doubting. Wanting to believe that it’s all true. Thinking we have to try harder, be better, in order for all the promises to prove authentic for us. Subconsciously holding on to some of our core beliefs like hypotheses that need testing, rather than authenticated facts. Wondering, wondering...is my personal faith strong enough? Would it hold up under the biggest test? (I barely make it through the small ones.) Will these ‘spiritual theories’ be supported by evidence when tested by fire?

This is the gist of my personal story...this is ‘that which I have witnessed firsthand and can therefore authenticate’:

I am weak, wavering, inconsistent, complex, and conflicted. I cannot will myself to stay strong, be selfless, keep the faith, fight the fight. I identify with the Apostle Paul in Romans 7 when he confesses, “I want to do what is right, but I can’t. I want to do what is good, but I don’t. I don’t want to do what is wrong, but I do it anyway...” My best is not good enough.

I cannot hold fast to what I know is true.

But...

the Truth holds.

He holds fast to me.


He holds us all.

...and in Him all things hold together.



That is my public testimony.

Hi Friends,

Just a note to let you know we're still around. I'm sorry I haven't posted in a while... 'technical difficulties'...but I hope to in the next day or so.

Thank you for waiting with us.

Love,
Kim

Waiting

Last week, I left California for the third time since April 21 to attend the celebration of a niece’s marriage in Palm Beach. (The wedding itself was a secret elopement to Positano, Italy...great idea, girls!) It was a joyful time, especially since it is rare for all of my husband’s siblings to be together. We were also celebrating the fact that both of his parents are cancer-free now. There were four generations out on the dance floor together...laughing, sweating, acting crazy. The groom’s nieces were tiny little tippy-toed ballerinas that indefatiguably pirouetted and flitted through the crowd throughout the evening. As I held hands with one of them for the Last Dance, I had a flashback of doing the same with Katherine years ago.

Growing up, my kids would dance in any public arena at the slightest provocation. Juke box in a diner? They’re there. Mariachi’s at a Mexican restaurant? There. Chicken Dance at an Oktoberfest? There. Boardwalk-on-the-beach-band on the fourth of July? Not just there, but grabbing the mike from the lead singer. (Okay, that part just applies to one child.) My girls didn’t care what anyone thought, they just danced exuberantly, joyfully...whatever, whenever the occasion.

Brooks and I were somber on the flight back out to California. Katherine would have loved a family celebration like that. She would have chosen some peripheral relative-of-a-relative and entered into an in-depth conversation about his or her life, making the guest feel at home and valued. She would have made sure that each member of the groom’s family knew each member of the bride’s family. She would have allowed James to be passed around by all the relatives like a chunky little hot potato. And she would have danced. She would have danced with her grandfather, her father, her uncles, her husband. Jay might have bent her backwards over the dance floor, borrowing moves from their own wedding dance.

When Brooks and I arrived at Casa Colina, Katherine and Jay just happened to be coming out of the TLC. (Transitional Living Center.) Brooks was already out of the car, but I was gathering up all my stuff. Jay wheeled her over closer to the car. I glanced up. I felt as if someone had socked me in the stomach.

You forget.

And then it hits you with fresh horror.

The edges of temporary denial start peeling back like cellophane, exposing naked, harsh reality. Tachycardia seizes me, shaking me until I can barely breathe. Inside, I start screaming, “Oh my God, no, no, no.....that’s not my Katherine...this isn’t really happening...make it go away...make her get up out of that chair and talk to me...fix her face back...is this some kind of a joke? Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, help me, help us....”

I pretend to search for something on the floorboard until I can get it together.

As I start walking over to her, Katherine’s shoulders begin to shake with silent sobs. I pull her head to my chest and hold her. “It’s been a horrible week,” she manages to get out. I realize that she’s been brave until now...like a child who gets hurt at nursery school, gets over it, but then loses it again when her mama comes to pick her up. Or when a bereaved person cries afresh with each new comforter. “I know,” I say...for surely every week must be horrible now, no matter what the particulars are.

As I drove the rental car to the rental house, I shifted my mindset back to the New Reality and said the Serenity Prayer. Things were starting to feel familiar again by the time the pedestrian entourage arrived with the wheelchair. We got Katherine settled on the couch and she began to fill in some details of the previous week. “Miss A” does indeed have it in for her. She has become more verbally abusive towards Katherine, and sometimes has physically violent explosions of anger. She appears to think that Katherine’s Christian name is actually “Bitch,” and refers to her in no other way. Staff members believe it’s likely that Miss A’s brain injury has caused her to confuse Katherine with someone from her past. Miss A’s relationship with Jay is even more complicated. She has volunteered to have his baby, and fondly refers to him as “A**hole.” After Jay tucks Katherine in at the TLC, he tries to sneak past the other patients’ rooms as quietly as he can. Almost every night, just as he makes it almost to the exit, he hears a slow, guttural “Goodnight, A**hole...”echo creepily down the dark hall. It may be gallows humor, but for some reason we find this hysterically funny. Jay is just so not an A**hole.

The challenges Katherine faces with fellow brain-injured patients are nothing, however, compared to the agonies of coming to terms with the major deficits she has suffered. Day after laborious day she climbs up Mt. Everest with a backpack full of rocks on her back, only to discover that she’s progressed an inch at most. Some days seem like a rockslide. She is tired and thirsty. She feels as if she is starving to death every waking moment. I pray such suffering will not be wasted. Although her attitude is amazingly positive most of the time, every now and then I’ll catch her slumped in her chair, staring into space. She looks like a broken little rag doll.

When I was a little girl, I had a Madame Alexander doll named Kelly that was a “play doctor” doll. She came with crutches, casts, bandages, syringes...even tiny paste-on measles and mumps! I grew up making rounds at the hospital with my father, so I loved exercising my healing powers over this perpetually sick or injured girl. But one day, something inside her popped. Whatever held her head and limbs securely fastened to her torso malfunctioned. I was furious that I couldn’t fix her. Although my mother promised that we would take her to the Doll Hospital in Atlanta, other priorities prevailed. To this day, she lies, dismembered, in her original box in the closet of my childhood room.

How many times I dreamed of marching her into that (probably mythical) Doll Hospital and demanding that they fix her! How many times a day I feel like forcing entry at Heaven’s Gates, marching up to the throne, handing Katherine back to the One who made her, and demanding that He heal her!

Then I calm down and try to remember the Promises. She will be restored...she will have a future and a hope...she will have a ministry...her life is not over yet...

...even though everything “Seen” seems to argue against these Unseen hopes and dreams.

And we wait.

Which is something I don’t do well. It’s ironic that those of us who are “Time-Challenged” are the least patient people on earth. Those who make others wait hate waiting more than anything. But patience is an old-fashioned virtue for most of us in this Quick Fix Society. We’re ticked if we have to wait two minutes in a check-out line or at a stoplight. We want to get it done! Solve the problem! Fix it NOW! It is so hard to learn to do nothing and wait upon the Lord.

I heard a great sermon once on God’s Timing. The speaker, who knew this from painful personal experience, said, “We’ve all heard that when God closes one door, He opens another...but IT’S HELL IN THE HALLWAY.”

That’s where we are right now. Out in the hallway looking at a lot of closed doors...hoping one will open soon. Trying to trust that one will. In God’s timing, not ours.

It may be a while until Katherine is back out on the dance floor. But I believe that she will be someday, somehow. In the meantime, I am researching Waiting. Maybe I’ll share what I learn with you...one of these days. But you may have to wait.

Thank you for your patience. Please pray some for me, too.

***************

“...For the Lord is a faithful God.
Blessed are those who wait on Him.”
Isaiah 30:18b (NLT)

“But if we look forward to something we don’t yet have, we must wait patiently and confidently.”
Romans 8:25 (NLT)

Tender Mercies

(This was started shortly after Katherine left UCLA for Pomona.)

I wrote earlier of the need to come up with something far better than “thank you” to express the heart-wrenching gratitude I feel. I never came up with anything. Then, this morning, after reading the previous blog’s comments, the phrase “Mille mercis” popped into my head.

With no internet access in the apartment, I can’t just click onto Webster’s or LaRousse’s to investigate etymologies. (And there’s no time to run down to Starbucks.) But it is interesting that the French word for ‘thank you’ so closely mirrors ours for ‘mercy.’ I think I remember from my college French that “remercier” is the French infinitive for “to thank.” To give back mercy?

“Mille mercis”...to give back a thousand mercies?

Is that like forgiving 70x7? Code for infinity?

That’s what it will take in this case. I plead Heaven to pour out an infinite number of mercies on all of you who have poured yourselves out for us. The phrase “a drink offering” comes to mind. When we have been dying of thirst, you have offered a cup overflowing.

So before we can completely turn our attention to Casa Colina and the adventures there, I feel that I must first look back and reflect on the past four months with humility and awe at the generosity of spirit (and everything else) with which we’ve been blessed.

Mille mercis a:

...all the saints of The City of The Angels, represented by the body of Bel Air Presbyterian Church...

...all those who kept faithful vigil in the lobby at UCLA for several long months...crying, praying, laughing, and just being with us...

...all of you who have prayed across the miles...

...the many “Baby Whisperers” who cuddled and loved James to sleep while his mommy fought for her life...

...the selfless friends who took him into their home and cared for him as if he were their own...

...the hundreds who brought the food, THE FOOD!!!, the banquets of nurturing food, that descended like manna on us day after long day...

...those who gave us the many lavish gifts of love: from beautiful flowers to soothing music, inspiring books, journals, funny DVD's, meaningful jewelry, pictures, crosses, scripture cards, cozy blankets, lovely handmade things, stuffed animals, sachets, ‘self-pampering’ treats of lotions and such, fruit baskets, wine, and goodies galore...

...the stellarly talented friends who’ve used the gifts God has given them to create inspired music in Katherine’s honor and for the blessing of many...

...the friend who came across country to deliver an inspiring DVD with messages of love and support...

...the Flower Picture Lady and the Purple Hippo Lady...

...the old friend who sent old pictures to remind me that time heals many things...

...my “LA daughters” who treated me with a hair appointment at Beverly Hills’ finest for Mother’s Day...

...those who selflessly ferried family members back and forth to the airport, in spite of the gas prices...

...the errand runners who supplied us with everything we needed, and then some more...usually at their own expense...

...those compassionate ladies who arranged for me to have massages when I could barely walk...

...everyone who took the time to share loving words of encouragement through calls, texts, letters, cards, emails, and comments on the blog and caringbridge...

...those who fought the LA traffic and the UCLA parking nightmare to come for visits...

...those who flew across country to be at our side in the hours of need...

...the amazingly faithful friends who helped us “Katherine-sit” when we couldn’t leave her in the room alone, “sleeping” on the torture chair/bed...

...those who spent hours and hours organizing schedules and communicating for us...

...the teachers who sent beautiful pictures from children to brighten the drab walls...

...those who exhibited the gift of hospitality to family members...especially to the one who shared his beautiful Bel-Air home as a peaceful refuge from the storm...

...members of the medical community who have shared advice...

...the churches who sent beautiful prayer shawls and/or continue to keep Katherine on their intercessory prayer lists...

...friends who’ve come to take us out to dinner for a hospital break...

...AVM and stroke survivors who have shared their personal stories and faithfully continue to cheer Katherine on...

...friends in Athens who’ve taken my mother to lunch and kept her from being lonely...

...and those who’ve taken care of my husband in my absence with delicious dinners, invitations, and calls of support...

...all the anonymous new friends who pray for someone they’ve never even met...

...my incredible buddies (YaYas) of 50+ years who’ve seen me at my absolute worst and love me anyway...who hug me and rub me and put me to bed...

...my wonderful, patient friends who email or call with no expectation of response...

...and especially to my faithful little friend who contacts me (or a daughter) practically every day, helping me feel ‘almost normal’ by sending news from home along with her love and prayers...

...And finally, to Dr. Nestor Gonzalez and the incredible staff at UCLA Medical Center. How do you thank someone for saving your child’s life? To Dr. Gonzalez and the countless other doctors, nurses, care partners, PTs, OTs, and STs...may God bless you all with thousands upon thousands of mercies for the tender mercy you have shown to Katherine and our family. You are tireless, selfless, compassionate, and caring. We will never forget the many loving faces and the gentle hands that were instruments of God’s healing. Words are completely inadequate...but I hope you can read my heart, if not my mind.

My mother has always said, “If I don’t ask “Why me?” in the good times, why should I in the bad?” I agree with the underlying philosophy of that. But in this case, I do ask “Why?” There’s some terrible tragedy every millisecond down here on the fallen planet. The cumulative affect can be desensitizing for many of us...it’s easy to shutdown and numb-out from the burden of overwhelming sadness in the world. It’s difficult enough to deal with the issues we face in our own families, much less anyone else’s. So the question I have in this case is: “Why us? Why have so many people sustained such interest and compassionate involvement in our family’s crisis? Why have people cared so much?” It is stunning, shocking...humbling, convicting. I grieve over lost opportunities to serve others as I have been served in this situation. I resolve not to miss another, knowing in advance that I probably will.

As I write these words, I recognize a little of that payback (or pay-it-forward) mentality. I wonder why it’s so hard simply to receive. If you give me a Christmas present, I need to give you one back. Particularly in the South, we feel the compulsion to pay back casserole for casserole. Maybe it makes us feel empowered in some way not to owe anything to anyone...American independence and all that. But it can’t be done here. I can never repay the thousand kindnesses we’ve experienced. Sometimes the only thing you can do is receive. Gratefully, helplessly...receive.

I’m finishing this several weeks after I started it. In the meantime, I’ve had access to the Information Highway, and found that the word “mercy” is from the Medieval Latin “merced-, merces," from Latin, “price paid, wages.” It points me back to the ultimate mercy. I’ve been bought with a price that is impossible to repay. There is nothing I can do but unclench my tight fists and receive...

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I will never forget this awful time,
as I grieve over my loss.
Yet I still dare to hope
when I remember this:
The faithful love of the Lord never ends!
His mercies never cease.
Great is his faithfulness;
his mercies begin afresh every morning.
I say to myself, “The Lord is my inheritance;
therefore I will hope in Him!”
Lamentions 3:20-24 (NLT)

Postscript on Drowning

The day after publishing “Drowning,’ the passage below “just happened” to be my daily reading. I probably haven’t read the story in decades.

I’m not sure why I employ so much water imagery...a Freudian most likely would explain it using a lot of primeval birth symbolism. From earliest memory, I have loved water of all sources...creek, pond, river, lake, ocean. Growing up, I lived in a swimming pool during hot Georgia summers. Swimming has always made me feel free. I especially love it in ocean and lake...maybe the little thrill of fear of what lies beneath the surface makes it even more delicious. But sometimes things we love can turn on us; the good becomes dangerous. I think that’s why it is so important to be careful what we love. Swimming can become drowning in a swift second. A ripple rapidly turns into torrent.

A few years ago, I made up a short children’s fable which used the various manifestations of H2O as metaphor for the Trinity. The Father was crystalline ice, the Spirit appeared as steam, but the Son was water...beautiful, quenching, living water. (Sometimes simplistic explanations help me with metaphysical mysteries.) It is interesting that The Book begins and ends with water, and the theme streams its way through all the books in between. It is first mentioned in the second verse, Gen. 1:2: “...and darkness covered the deep waters. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the surface of the waters.” It appears in the last chapter, Rev. 22: “Then the angel showed me a river with the water of life, clear as crystal, flowing from the throne of God.....Let anyone who is thirsty come. Let anyone who desires drink freely from the water of life...”

Obviously, great significance is attached to the element of water. It may save us or destroy us...cleanse us or kill us. It is the vehicle of both baptism and The Flood. But God has dominion over all the waters from first to last, and uses them for his purposes.

I hope I will remember that the next time I’m drowning.

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In the context of these musings, here's the celestial response to the last blog:

Jonah 2

Jonah's Prayer

1 From inside the fish Jonah prayed to the LORD his God.

2 He said: "In my distress I called to the LORD, and he answered me.
From the depths of the grave I called for help,
and you listened to my cry.

3 You hurled* me into the deep,
into the very heart of the seas,
and the currents swirled about me;
all your waves and breakers
swept over me.

4 I said, 'I have been banished
from your sight;
yet I will look again
toward your holy temple.'

5 The engulfing waters threatened me,
the deep surrounded me;
seaweed was wrapped around my head.

6 To the roots of the mountains I sank down;
the earth beneath barred me in forever.
But you brought my life up from the pit,
O LORD my God.

7 "When my life was ebbing away,
I remembered you, LORD,
and my prayer rose to you,
to your holy temple.

8 "Those who cling to worthless idols
forfeit the grace that could be theirs.

9 But I, with a song of thanksgiving,
will sacrifice to you.
What I have vowed I will make good.
Salvation comes from the LORD."

10 And the LORD commanded the fish, and it vomited Jonah onto dry land.

(* We could spend hours debating God’s perfect will vs. God’s permissive will. Did God cause Katherine’s brain rupture, or did he allow it in the sense of natural laws operating in an imperfect world to which sickness and death are intrinsic? I choose to believe that it is the latter, and that He permits nothing to occur to his children which He cannot use for their ultimate good and for His greater purposes.)

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...So here’s a little prayer from the belly of the whale, if anyone happens to be there now:

Father, forgive me from trying to run away from you, like Jonah. Protect me from myself. Forgive me for clinging to things...false life-preservers...that cause me to forfeit the grace you long to lavish on me. Remind me to thank and praise you for all things, in all things...even here in the belly of a whale. I thank you that I cannot save myself, so that I may more fully appreciate the great gift of your rescue. Thank you for stooping low enough to reach your hand down into the slimy pit of depression and self-pity and pull me out, setting me upon a Rock. I thank you that you always listen and answer...even in the midst of my rebellion. Enable me to make the sacrifice of a contrite heart to you, for you desire that much more than outward gestures of gratitude.

Command those things which imprison me in the depths to set me free. All creation trembles at the sound of your voice.

Help me to keep my promises to you, for even that I cannot do.

But your faithfulness endures forever.

Drowning

The nature of this experience precludes consistency. Because of that, I have about 20 unfinished blogs floating around my laptop. I had a rhythm going when we were staying at the hotel and walking back and forth to the hospital several times a day. But now there is little rhyme or reason to my schedule. With constant interruptions and vacillating plans and schedules, it is easy to start a story and then forget about it or lose momentum and interest. Plus, the internet situation makes it much more logistically challenging now.

Some of the unfinished stories need to be told, however. There is one which I have been putting off because I don’t think I can do it justice. (Or maybe it’s because it is too intensely spiritual, and I am afraid.) It is startling how quickly very vivid experiences start to fade into haze now...sensory overload, I suppose. But it was confirmed to me recently that I need to try to conjure up the memory fragments of that time.

In the meantime, I will share this one:

Last week, rather than borrowing a car and fighting vicious traffic, I spent several days in Pomona staying at Jay’s house. It was an exhausting, emotional, intense time for Katherine. More new patients have been admitted, and some are extremely volatile and combative. There are only a few female patients whose personalities have not been altered by their brain injuries, so that makes for some interesting interactions. There is a lot of yelling, crying, and even throwing. During one patient’s outburst, Katherine was so scared that she covered her head with her hands and tried to duck under her desk...even though the throwing was several rooms away. Katherine believes that one new patient in particular has it in for her, although it is my observation that it is just a problem with impulse control. Maybe this girl’s pre-frontal cortex was affected. (I’m just starting to study brain books...it is a fascinating topic.) Anyway, Grace and I witnessed one encounter when we sat in on Kat’s “Cognitive Dev.” class. The patients got to play a card game with each other. It was “Miss A’s” turn to play, but she was busily describing to one of the aides (in graphic detail) what she was planning to do with a certain young gentleman. Katherine called her name to tell her it was her turn. “Miss A” slowly turned around and pierced Katherine with a laser look. Then she turned it upon Grace and then on me to make sure we were watching. She sent it back to Katherine and in a slow, deep voice she hissed out her response: “Bitch.”

Katherine was born living Phil. 1:8: “Fix your thoughts on what is true, honorable, right, pure, lovely, and admirable. Think about things that are excellent and worthy of praise.”(NLT) Ugly words are like poison to her spirit.

Later that afternoon, we wheeled her back to the house. She was pensive in spite of our efforts to entertain. When I asked her if anything was wrong, she said, “Mom, I feel like I’m drowning. I’m drowning, but no one can help me.”

I guess it’s obvious from previous entries that I know something about drowning, but I’ve never heard Katherine use the analogy before. (Remember, she’s the one who floats.) I comforted her as best I could. Of course, she immediately wiped away her tears and told me that she’s okay, not to worry.

Shortly after this, we grabbed a movie out of the stack and put it in for a little distraction. When Jay came back and saw what we’d picked, he paused it for a moment to give us some
background information. The Diving Bell and The Butterfly is the true story of a Frenchman, the chief editor of Elle magazine, who suffered a massive stroke at the age of 44. The result was that he lived the rest of his life with “Locked-In Syndrome,” a condition of almost complete paralysis. Although his intellect was completely untouched, he was never again able to move anything other than one eyelid. He wrote the memoir on which the movie is based by blinking as a nurse went through the alphabet a letter at a time. One word could take 5 minutes. After Jay had finished describing the movie to us, I asked Katherine if she wouldn’t rather watch a comedy that day. No, she wanted to see the stroke movie.

An image stood out: The man dreams he is at the bottom of the ocean, trapped inside one of those old metal diving suits used before oxygen tanks. Like the Man In the Iron Mask, the walls of his prison touch his very flesh. Weighed down and drowning, he is utterly alone. The silence screams. No one comes to help.

As I was scrolling through the unfinished blogs this morning, I ran across notes I’d made the morning after a strange dream I had the first month after Katherine's surgery. In the dream, a little blonde girl was running and skipping over large slate stones scattered in a pond. Suddenly, she slipped and fell backwards, hitting her head on a hard stone. She sank into the water and down to the murky bottom. In slow motion, I put my face into the slimy water and tried to find her, but I couldn’t see. Long panicky minutes ticked by. Finally, I spotted her and dove down, grabbed her, and started back towards the surface. But the water was so dark that I became disoriented and couldn’t tell which way was up. Just as I ran out of air, we burst through the cloudy green ceiling. I dragged the little girl, who now seemed much smaller-almost a baby- over to a bank. She was limp and lifeless. I began beating her on the back, but nothing happened. Then someone came up and took her from me. I lay on the ground, defeated and devastated. But when I looked up, I saw the little girl moving and smiling in the Someone’s arms.

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“Do not be afraid, for I have ransomed you.

I have called you by name, you are mine.

When you go through deep waters,

I will be with you.

When you go through rivers of difficulty,

you will not drown.”

Is. 43: 1b-2a (NLT)

(Now that I’ve thought about it, I believe I will count that dream as a Memorial Stone.)

Then and Now

Katherine is no stranger to stares.

I remember a funny incident several years back. When Katherine and Jay first moved to the West Coast, they were fresh out of college and full of adventure. They took advantage of the richness of the LA experience, the beauty of the Malibu coast, the fun of the celebrity carnival. They got a kick out of the whole thing without taking it (or themselves) too seriously. Jay has a photographic memory, so he quickly learned all the short cuts around town. He could skim through a People Magazine for 30 seconds at the grocery checkout, and then point out a minor B-list starlet at the drug store. Since neither he nor Katherine ever met a stranger, this engendered some intriguing experiences. (Case in point: the Oscar photo with Hilary Swank that was on the Caringbridge site for a while.)

When friends or relatives came out to visit, we were given the royal treatment. For instance, a young cousin got to meet both the Hilton sisters on the same trip. (Paris said, “That’s hot,” when Katherine mentioned they’d run into Nicki earlier.) We stayed at the old Roosevelt in Hollywood, shared the ladies’ room at Mr. Chow’s with Jessica Alba, shopped on Rodeo. It was a blast. But since both Katherine and Jay are exceedingly frugal, they devised methods to do it all on a dime.

“The Ivy” is one of the poshest lunchspots in LA. It is a charming, flower-dripping Country French cottage on Robertson decorated with vintage pieces. (It is also where Amie almost died on another occasion, but that’s a long story...maybe it will be on “Amie’s Mom’s Blog” one day.)The best seat in the house is a cozy enclave on the front porch consisting of an old wicker settee overflowing with fluffy English chintz pillows, a shabby chic table, and little bistro chairs. The first time she saw it, Katherine said, “Mom would love this.” So do all the celebs, which brings us to what is not charming about The Ivy: swarms of paparazzi crowding the narrow sidewalk in front, impeding your way in. The prices are another negative. So Katherine and Jay devised a strategy. They would take their guests during the lull time between late-lunch and early hors d’oeuvres, and order coffee and one food item to share: The Ivy’s signature banana split, which is served on a platter and is big enough to feed the Russian Army.

So, on to the incident in question. Too thrifty for Valet Parking, Jay dropped Amie and me off to secure a table, while he and Katherine circled for a parking spot. Disappointed to hear that there was no room at the inn, we started walking back down the sidewalk. We ran into Katherine and Jay on their way up to join us. They just laughed when we told them we’d been turned away. Katherine was fairly fixed up that day. (i.e.: actually had on some makeup and had washed her hair.) She immediately went into character and marched through the swarm of photographers and up the steps as if she owned the place. We, her entourage, were quickly ushered in...not to a side table near the bathroom, but to that glorious front and central spot. (Amie and I gave the maitre d’ a triumphant glance as we walked by.) Every eye in the place was on the striking 5’10”blonde, the paparazzi abuzz: Was she Somebody? Or about to be?

For some reason, I thought about that the other day on Casa Colina’s field trip.

We made a motley crew. The five female patients and four staff members (with one mom along for the ride) were taken in vans to a nail salon in a nearby town. It was no small feat to get all of those wheelchairs and walkers loaded up. We had several false starts, and then got a little lost. But Katherine gabbed the whole way there, excited to be in a vehicle other than an ambulance for the first time since April 20. Starting and stopping like a herd of turtles, we finally made our grand entrance into the salon.

It got quiet. Every eye in the place...


The Ivy was then.

The nail spa is now.

Blessed be the name of the Lord.

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