Last month I had a skin biopsy done at the corner of my left eye. Nothing to be concerned about, just routine. However, the area around my eye did not enjoy being frozen, cut open and sewn back up again and thus I came home with a shiner Mohammad Ali would have been proud of. I hadn’t checked after I left the hospital parking lot, had three appointments afterwards not realizing that I looked like I’d taken a sucker-punch. When I walked in the kitchen door later that afternoon, the kids were horrified. “Mom! What happened to your face?” I took a look in the mirror and was amazed. It looked…bad!
The bruising spread and then began turning some brilliant colours. It lasted four weeks (I have just a smudge of a bruise left that I can finally cover up with makeup). For the first three weeks, everyone I saw had the same reaction: an immediate look of shock and then the voicing of heart-felt concern until I could assure them that although it was very tender, it really was nothing, just a bruise. The first Sunday I stayed home from church. I was a little embarrassed and hated that I was making everyone so concerned. The second week I made myself go after unsuccessfully trying to arrange my hair to fall over my left eye.
I keep thinking about that bruise, how visible it was, how meaningless it was, and how much of a reaction it kept getting. I would have reacted the exact same way had I seen someone I cared about with a swollen eye. But it got me thinking about how easy it is to get distracted by what we see, and forget that much of what is really going on can be invisible to the sight.
I walk around with a bleeding heart that most of the time is unnoticeable. The cashier doesn’t see it. The parking attendant didn’t. The person standing in line in front of me and the one behind had no idea of the road I am travelling, of the sorrow that still engulfs me, the feeling of instability, the sleeplessness. How could they? Why would they?
And what do I not see? Those same people could be battling an entire world of pain invisible to the naked eye, just as I am. Many are. It changes the way I look at people. I get distracted by the black eyes when what I should be aware of are the wounded spirits. And not being so quick to judge the actions of those who bear them.
I have written little of my Taeryn’s brain injury. It has been a source of intense pain and fear for me, wondering what this will mean for her long-term, longing to be told nothing is different, that there is no damage. But there is.
When we were in the hospital I kept noticing little changes that grew to be larger ones. Her behaviour was different. She had forgotten all the phonics she had been taught, couldn’t remember what words like “opposite” meant, had frequent short-term memory loss, became incredibly impulsive and sometimes behaviourally had me confused. It could just be the trauma, I was told, or the grief. But something wasn’t right, I was sure of it.
As time went on I became more convinced that something was wrong and as I brought it up to other medical professionals, red-flags began popping up until finally it was investigated. A specialized MRI revealed 15 axonal tears in her frontal lobe from where she had most likely hit the windshield. And thus began a whole new path of specialists and appointments.
Recently we began her on an ADD drug to help with the lack of focus and the attention deficit. I quickly did 180 degree turn from poo-pooing the use of such medications to getting on my knees and thanking God for them. Suddenly, there was more of the Taeryn I knew. They don’t change everything but what they did do is remarkable. On the outside, Taeryn is still Taeryn. She is sweet, kind, energetic, loving. I am so grateful for this, for the fact that with just a little more force, she might have lost the ability to move or speak as so many people have.
There is a lot going on in the places we cannot see. Circumstances can make more of a difference than we know. I remember comments earlier on in the year about her behaviour, comments that although not unkind, made me cringe because they represented a little girl who was struggling with something she could not control. Made me cringe because I wanted to somehow show people who she really was, not just what her brain was making her do. Made me cringe because I feared that my parenting would be put into question, that I wasn’t doing “a good enough job”. I wonder how many kids I’ve judged, how many parents I’ve raised my eyebrows at over the years in criticism. Granted, there is probably a lot of bad parenting in the world. I’m sure I’ve added my share. But I’m staring at the reality that for years I’ve reverted to judging on what I’ve seen on the outside. I’ve looked at the black eye. I’ve dismissed the possibility of a hidden world that is not visible to me, whether physical, chemical or emotional. And I feel convicted.
Last March, fresh out of the hospital, I took the kids out to celebrate Karson’s 6th birthday. We were driving a friend’s Chevy Tahoe. Our van that was in the crash had sliding doors that didn’t swing open. The Tahoe’s door open outwardly and Taeryn wasn’t used to that so when we got out in the parking lot, she swung the door open not realizing that it could ding the side of the car parked next to us. Which it did.
It was just a dime-sized ding, but it was a nice enough car (although the back had a huge dent from an obvious fender-bender). Taeryn was mortified. I was trying to decide whether to leave a note or hang around until the owners got back, when I realized that a couple and their child were approaching. Sure enough, it was their car. I explained what had happened and then stood in shock while they had a conniption. Taeryn was crying, I was trying to explain that it wasn’t our vehicle, that I could give them the insurance information and my driver’s licence and I was floored at the way they were handling the situation. Rudely. Like it was a massive deal. I will break my “no judgement” conviction revelation here for a moment to say that they were looking at the black eye.
I remember standing there, holding my driver’s licence out after she snorted that I would purposely read it out incorrectly to her, feeling the anger and sorrow rising within. I looked at my four children, casted, in pain, having just gone through the worst of the worst, fresh out of the hospital, and wanted to scream at this couple with all my might, “You think THIS is bad? You think THIS makes a difference? Would you like to know what a REALLY bad situation is? Let me tell you. Let me just describe the hell we’ve been through the past three months and then you can let me know if this tiny scratch on your hunk of metal warrants this incredibly arrogant and cynical behaviour.”
But I didn’t. I let her write down the information and swallowed the desire to put things into perspective for them. Maybe they had just come from a funeral. Maybe they had just lost a loved-one. Or maybe they hadn’t.
I don’t know if it would have made a difference. What I do know is that they saw only what was visible. I suspect that they didn’t take a moment to consider that there was an entirely different world existing beneath the surface, a world we were drowning in, one we left only to take a gulp of air out of this one before sinking down into it again. They never knew.
I wonder how often I’ve never known.
Wednesday, May 16, 2012
Tuesday, April 24, 2012
The Stone
You do not know what you are capable of, until the situation asks of you what was never thought possible. I know this now. I can think of conversation after conversation where I’ve said, “I could never handle that,” or “I could not live through that,” only to find that somehow, supernaturally, I did.
It amazes me and yet in truthfulness it scares me as well. What will be asked of me? And while I do not spend much time dwelling on the possibilities, the realization that the human spirit can endure the unthinkable is not always assuring. I would feel better knowing that there is a limit, not this seemingly infinite ability to be stretched and scarred and traumatized and still be able to live -- to love, to believe. Is it a good thing? Or a terrible thing?
I look back over the past 16 months and stare in disbelief. Thinking back to the intensity of those first months in the hospital, the move home to live alone with four injured children, the round-the-clock care and attention necessary to meet the demands of so many undeniable needs and responsibilities -- I cannot believe it was endurable. And yet here we are. Here I am. We live this life seasoned with the perspective that our gracious God supplies our needs; that we were supported by the goodness of friends, family and strangers; and that for so many around the world, our experiences would not even be close to their worst day.
I find myself breathing a sigh of relief, thinking the worst has passed only to find that there are those things that feel as though they should be simple, do-able, easy in comparison…that aren‘t. Sometimes it is those little events that cause the biggest stirrings, that create an unforeseen strain and I find myself mystified that I can walk the depths of sorrow, then stumble over a relatively simple task.
We are not predictable.
The past couple of days have been difficult. A couple of weeks ago a good friend called me after visiting Myron’s gravesite and simply and graciously said, “Gillian, it’s time.” I knew she was right and yet I had been dreading it. Did not want to think about it. I had not yet ordered his tombstone. Was unable to do it, literally.
Every time we’ve gone to the grave I’ve felt a sadness and a burden that there is only a plastic marker with his name and yet I have been rendered incapable of putting this final touch to his death. I’ve tried. I’ve given myself deadlines, spent hours writing epitaphs, looked on the internet for help…and could never take the step to actually do it. At first it was because I truly could not physically attend to another detail, but as time went on, I knew I was facing something that was far more difficult than I had ever imagined. And so when my friend gently asked permission to nudge me, I asked her to please make the appointment for me. Because I knew I never would.
How do I encapsulate the life of someone so meaningful with a few words on a stone? How can I possibly express who he was, what he meant to us, who we are without him on a 2x2 foot slab of granite? It felt impossible. It is impossible. And so, like so many things in life, you do the best you can and hope it is something you can live with for years to come.
Today was the appointment date. Today I ordered the stone that will mark his grave forever. Today is the day I did the last thing that needed to be done for Myron’s life on earth. Today was hard.
It lifted the shame that in expressing my sadness that I hadn’t been able to do it sooner, my friend reminded me that Myron’s supernatural gift of procrastination wouldn’t have necessarily guaranteed a speedy stone on my grave either. That helped. A little. At least it made me smile. As did the memory of a particularly colourful relative who one can only describe as a genuine hillbilly, a distant cousin who lived as a bachelor in Montana, gone to glory now, who always carried a squeeze bottle of ketchup in one of his backside overall pockets and a bottle of BBQ sauce in the other…just in case. Who kept a shotgun inside his hollow, wooden peg-leg. Who was about 6'3", 300 lbs, and handed out baggies with a chunk of sausage and assorted pieces of rock candy to all of us kids whenever we saw him. Who once, after a ride at the carnival, threw up his dentures into a trashcan, fished them out, licked them clean and replaced them in his mouth. And, when we visited him at his family homestead many years after his father had passed, was found living with his father’s tombstone in the living room, propped up against the side of the couch. Maybe I could give myself a little grace, after all.
And so I found the picture I wanted, a professional shot of Myron running the Vancouver Marathon, and wrote and wrote and re-wrote what should go beneath it. Nothing seemed perfect. So I went with what moved my heart.
Myron Neil Berg
June 15, 1962 - December 28, 2010
You’ve finished the only race worth running; keeping
your eyes on Jesus, and loving us all along your way.
There was no room to say all I wanted to: To thank him for all he had given us; to memorialize all he was; to pay tribute to all he had left behind; to emphasize all we miss and long for without him. I guess I will have to be satisfied that I’ve made those statements here. That we’ll live those statements forever.
Yes, today was a hard day. I finished what needed to be done, then went to my first baseball game since the accident where my daughter played and my husband was missing. It was a day of finishing and a day of beginning. And it was all hard. And I felt my spirit stretch again for the millionth time.
It amazes me and yet in truthfulness it scares me as well. What will be asked of me? And while I do not spend much time dwelling on the possibilities, the realization that the human spirit can endure the unthinkable is not always assuring. I would feel better knowing that there is a limit, not this seemingly infinite ability to be stretched and scarred and traumatized and still be able to live -- to love, to believe. Is it a good thing? Or a terrible thing?
I look back over the past 16 months and stare in disbelief. Thinking back to the intensity of those first months in the hospital, the move home to live alone with four injured children, the round-the-clock care and attention necessary to meet the demands of so many undeniable needs and responsibilities -- I cannot believe it was endurable. And yet here we are. Here I am. We live this life seasoned with the perspective that our gracious God supplies our needs; that we were supported by the goodness of friends, family and strangers; and that for so many around the world, our experiences would not even be close to their worst day.
I find myself breathing a sigh of relief, thinking the worst has passed only to find that there are those things that feel as though they should be simple, do-able, easy in comparison…that aren‘t. Sometimes it is those little events that cause the biggest stirrings, that create an unforeseen strain and I find myself mystified that I can walk the depths of sorrow, then stumble over a relatively simple task.
We are not predictable.
The past couple of days have been difficult. A couple of weeks ago a good friend called me after visiting Myron’s gravesite and simply and graciously said, “Gillian, it’s time.” I knew she was right and yet I had been dreading it. Did not want to think about it. I had not yet ordered his tombstone. Was unable to do it, literally.
Every time we’ve gone to the grave I’ve felt a sadness and a burden that there is only a plastic marker with his name and yet I have been rendered incapable of putting this final touch to his death. I’ve tried. I’ve given myself deadlines, spent hours writing epitaphs, looked on the internet for help…and could never take the step to actually do it. At first it was because I truly could not physically attend to another detail, but as time went on, I knew I was facing something that was far more difficult than I had ever imagined. And so when my friend gently asked permission to nudge me, I asked her to please make the appointment for me. Because I knew I never would.
How do I encapsulate the life of someone so meaningful with a few words on a stone? How can I possibly express who he was, what he meant to us, who we are without him on a 2x2 foot slab of granite? It felt impossible. It is impossible. And so, like so many things in life, you do the best you can and hope it is something you can live with for years to come.
Today was the appointment date. Today I ordered the stone that will mark his grave forever. Today is the day I did the last thing that needed to be done for Myron’s life on earth. Today was hard.
It lifted the shame that in expressing my sadness that I hadn’t been able to do it sooner, my friend reminded me that Myron’s supernatural gift of procrastination wouldn’t have necessarily guaranteed a speedy stone on my grave either. That helped. A little. At least it made me smile. As did the memory of a particularly colourful relative who one can only describe as a genuine hillbilly, a distant cousin who lived as a bachelor in Montana, gone to glory now, who always carried a squeeze bottle of ketchup in one of his backside overall pockets and a bottle of BBQ sauce in the other…just in case. Who kept a shotgun inside his hollow, wooden peg-leg. Who was about 6'3", 300 lbs, and handed out baggies with a chunk of sausage and assorted pieces of rock candy to all of us kids whenever we saw him. Who once, after a ride at the carnival, threw up his dentures into a trashcan, fished them out, licked them clean and replaced them in his mouth. And, when we visited him at his family homestead many years after his father had passed, was found living with his father’s tombstone in the living room, propped up against the side of the couch. Maybe I could give myself a little grace, after all.
And so I found the picture I wanted, a professional shot of Myron running the Vancouver Marathon, and wrote and wrote and re-wrote what should go beneath it. Nothing seemed perfect. So I went with what moved my heart.
Myron Neil Berg
June 15, 1962 - December 28, 2010
You’ve finished the only race worth running; keeping
your eyes on Jesus, and loving us all along your way.
There was no room to say all I wanted to: To thank him for all he had given us; to memorialize all he was; to pay tribute to all he had left behind; to emphasize all we miss and long for without him. I guess I will have to be satisfied that I’ve made those statements here. That we’ll live those statements forever.
Yes, today was a hard day. I finished what needed to be done, then went to my first baseball game since the accident where my daughter played and my husband was missing. It was a day of finishing and a day of beginning. And it was all hard. And I felt my spirit stretch again for the millionth time.
Wednesday, April 11, 2012
Baseball Season
In past years, the month of April has been bittersweet. While on the one hand it assures us that spring is on its way, that Easter is around the corner and that the weather should be warming up, it has also traditionally been the yearly starting point of insanity known as “baseball season”.
Baseball was big in our home. Myron was a lifelong fan of the sport and played on a men’s team until our second child arrived. When Lauren was five, he put her in softball. By the time she was seven, he was coaching. One year he coached two teams, Lauren’s and Bryn’s, which almost killed the both of us, but most recently, it was the older girls he was working with.
Watching very small children play baseball is…excruciating. Bless their little hearts, it’s a great sport but its about as exciting as watching a garden slug run a marathon. We put Bryn in t-ball when she was five and were pleased that she was excited. For two weeks she was enthusiastic and then she kind of lost interest. I was driving her home one night and asked how she was liking t-ball. “It’s okay,” she said, frowning, “but when do we finally get the TEA?” Poor Bryn. She was under the impression that it involved some sort of tea party. However, she persevered and became a good little player. Taeryn began her first year two summers ago and Lauren’s team continued on to Provincials in Myron’s last year of coaching. We were all touched to the heart when his entire team came to the funeral in their uniforms. I will never forget that.
Last year for the first time in ages, there was no baseball in our home. April came and went. Driving by the fields made me cry. Lauren broke down after visiting the team at a game for the first time. I didn’t know if anyone would ever play again, which I know would have made Myron very, very sad.
So, this Easter Monday found me sitting on our deck, wrestling with Lauren’s fast pitch helmet. She missed all of last season because of the injuries to her arm, but has been working hard at physiotherapy, over the year has slowly been improving, and was now looking at her first game of the season. After two days of searching for her equipment, we found the bag in the garage where her batting helmet and gloves were. There I also found the brand new cage (wire mask that attaches to the front of the helmet so she doesn’t get a ball in the face) Myron had bought three years ago, sitting in it’s wrapper, unattached.
No surprise.
I love my husband, but he had a terrible tendency to procrastinate. (Note early blog entry about our honeymoon where he vowed to get counselling for this problem. Never got around to it.) The mask wasn’t actually attached to the helmet, so I got out the tools, opened the instructions and began putting it together only to find out he had bought the wrong cage for her type of helmet.
“MYRON!” I found myself yelling at the sky. “FOR PETE’S SAKE, YOU BOUGHT THE WRONG CAGE!” It took me two hours to manipulate a four screw cage to fit a three screw helmet, but after taking it apart four times and adapting a few things, I got it on straight and sent her off to the game…where she found out the cage was also too heavy for her helmet, tipping it forward, rendering it useless and forcing her to borrow one from another player.
I use to dread baseball season because everything we did suddenly revolved around the team schedule. Meals were scheduled around practices, tournaments took over weekends, every minute was scheduling and drills, coaches meetings and training, clinics, games, the detailed stats Myron kept on every player. It dominated our lives. It drove me crazy. But Myron loved it. Loved it. Every year he became obsessed and I’d lie in bed listening as he went over every single play of the night, all the ump’s calls, what each girl did or didn’t do and his plans for the next day.
It seems impossible, but I miss it.
I don’t think its easy for Lauren to play without her dad there, watching, coaching, cheering her on. I know it hasn’t been easy for his assistant coach who has taken over the team, who misses his friend and the time they had together. It is the second spring without him and its just not the same. Plus now I have to go find a new cage and I don’t have a clue what I’m supposed to get. Karson insists he will never play baseball. I wonder why and hope some day this changes. Even if it means having to endure those introductory, mind-numbing games all over again.
On Sunday we went to the North Shore to meet friends who were taking us to their cabin for the afternoon. As we waited at the marina, I was talking to a gentleman who said, “It’s too bad you weren’t here earlier today…you missed about 100 dolphins that swam by, right over there!” My mouth was hanging open and then I had to laugh. I missed them AGAIN! First in Mexico then right here in our own backyard. But it didn’t sting as much this time. Because for the past two weeks we’ve had dolphins showing up all over the place. Metaphorically.
Dolphins showing up unexpectedly to clean out the garage and take everything away; dolphins who fixed the kids bikes and our backdoor.
Dolphins who gave us a used swimming pool out of the blue. Our old one was ruined and I had been praying to find one for the three other kids to use this summer as I might not be able to move Bryn anywhere after her surgery and they‘d be stuck at home.
Dolphins who left anonymous gifts both in our mailbox and at our back door.
Dolphins sending birthday cards, giving hugs, rides, and a meal on some very difficult days. This month, dolphins have been everywhere. And I’ve seen them all.
And then there was a whale, of sorts. A bizarre message that I wonder if anyone who misses Myron might take as much comfort in as I do. A medical practitioner who never knew or met Myron, who didn’t know us until she became part of the huge team of people treating us this past year, had a dream. She told us that in all the years she’s practiced, she’s never had a dream involving clients. But this week she did.
She was sent to heaven to deliver a pizza, of all things. Walking down a street that looked like a street in Disneyland, she found herself repeating, “The father of…, the father of…,” not knowing why. She knew she had to find building number 17 and when she did, went inside. The room was filled with people, but she noticed one man in particular and said, “The father of…the father of... Karson! Are you the father of Karson?” She knew it was Myron, and he smiled a big smile and said with great joy, “I am!”
“Are you Myron?” she asked.
“Yes!” he said.
“I know your kids!” she said in amazement. “How are you?”
Myron smiled and said, “I’m doing great!” She realized that he was busy doing a job, that he had been given a job in heaven, not a stuffy office job (her words) but that he was organizing something, socializing with the people around him and that they were all having fun. She realized she was supposed to deliver the pizza to him and after she gave it to him, woke up.
He is well. He is happy. He has been given the task of organizing things, which if you knew Myron, makes more sense than I can explain, and he is enjoying the people around him. She asked Taeryn, “Why would I be delivering pizza?” Taeryn said, “I don’t know…but my dad sure loved it!”
Its funny what you miss, and what you take comfort in. I’m grateful for it all. The other night at supper, Karson dropped his fork and yelled, “I just realized that daddy is talking to JESUS! He’s dancing with Jesus!” He looked at us with huge eyes. “That’s SO cool!”
It is. Not always easy to live with. But so very cool.
_________________________________________________________________
A NOTE: An amazing CD has been written and recorded by the very talented Steve Mitchinson and produced by the incredible Philip Janz, called “Giver of Life”. I wanted to put a link to it here as it is a beautiful collection of original songs designed for those who are in the end-stages of life. Steve Mitchinson is a British physician who now lives in B.C.’s lower mainland and has felt a special calling to care for the palliative. His CD is soothing, thought-provoking, and an oasis in the midst of suffering. I would highly encourage anyone who is either in the end-stages of earthly life or grieving the loss of a loved-one to follow this link. I was asked to write a review for it on Itunes, and it was an honour to do so.
http://itunes.apple.com/ca/album/giver-of-life/id511496718
Baseball was big in our home. Myron was a lifelong fan of the sport and played on a men’s team until our second child arrived. When Lauren was five, he put her in softball. By the time she was seven, he was coaching. One year he coached two teams, Lauren’s and Bryn’s, which almost killed the both of us, but most recently, it was the older girls he was working with.
Watching very small children play baseball is…excruciating. Bless their little hearts, it’s a great sport but its about as exciting as watching a garden slug run a marathon. We put Bryn in t-ball when she was five and were pleased that she was excited. For two weeks she was enthusiastic and then she kind of lost interest. I was driving her home one night and asked how she was liking t-ball. “It’s okay,” she said, frowning, “but when do we finally get the TEA?” Poor Bryn. She was under the impression that it involved some sort of tea party. However, she persevered and became a good little player. Taeryn began her first year two summers ago and Lauren’s team continued on to Provincials in Myron’s last year of coaching. We were all touched to the heart when his entire team came to the funeral in their uniforms. I will never forget that.
Last year for the first time in ages, there was no baseball in our home. April came and went. Driving by the fields made me cry. Lauren broke down after visiting the team at a game for the first time. I didn’t know if anyone would ever play again, which I know would have made Myron very, very sad.
So, this Easter Monday found me sitting on our deck, wrestling with Lauren’s fast pitch helmet. She missed all of last season because of the injuries to her arm, but has been working hard at physiotherapy, over the year has slowly been improving, and was now looking at her first game of the season. After two days of searching for her equipment, we found the bag in the garage where her batting helmet and gloves were. There I also found the brand new cage (wire mask that attaches to the front of the helmet so she doesn’t get a ball in the face) Myron had bought three years ago, sitting in it’s wrapper, unattached.
No surprise.
I love my husband, but he had a terrible tendency to procrastinate. (Note early blog entry about our honeymoon where he vowed to get counselling for this problem. Never got around to it.) The mask wasn’t actually attached to the helmet, so I got out the tools, opened the instructions and began putting it together only to find out he had bought the wrong cage for her type of helmet.
“MYRON!” I found myself yelling at the sky. “FOR PETE’S SAKE, YOU BOUGHT THE WRONG CAGE!” It took me two hours to manipulate a four screw cage to fit a three screw helmet, but after taking it apart four times and adapting a few things, I got it on straight and sent her off to the game…where she found out the cage was also too heavy for her helmet, tipping it forward, rendering it useless and forcing her to borrow one from another player.
I use to dread baseball season because everything we did suddenly revolved around the team schedule. Meals were scheduled around practices, tournaments took over weekends, every minute was scheduling and drills, coaches meetings and training, clinics, games, the detailed stats Myron kept on every player. It dominated our lives. It drove me crazy. But Myron loved it. Loved it. Every year he became obsessed and I’d lie in bed listening as he went over every single play of the night, all the ump’s calls, what each girl did or didn’t do and his plans for the next day.
It seems impossible, but I miss it.
I don’t think its easy for Lauren to play without her dad there, watching, coaching, cheering her on. I know it hasn’t been easy for his assistant coach who has taken over the team, who misses his friend and the time they had together. It is the second spring without him and its just not the same. Plus now I have to go find a new cage and I don’t have a clue what I’m supposed to get. Karson insists he will never play baseball. I wonder why and hope some day this changes. Even if it means having to endure those introductory, mind-numbing games all over again.
On Sunday we went to the North Shore to meet friends who were taking us to their cabin for the afternoon. As we waited at the marina, I was talking to a gentleman who said, “It’s too bad you weren’t here earlier today…you missed about 100 dolphins that swam by, right over there!” My mouth was hanging open and then I had to laugh. I missed them AGAIN! First in Mexico then right here in our own backyard. But it didn’t sting as much this time. Because for the past two weeks we’ve had dolphins showing up all over the place. Metaphorically.
Dolphins showing up unexpectedly to clean out the garage and take everything away; dolphins who fixed the kids bikes and our backdoor.
Dolphins who gave us a used swimming pool out of the blue. Our old one was ruined and I had been praying to find one for the three other kids to use this summer as I might not be able to move Bryn anywhere after her surgery and they‘d be stuck at home.
Dolphins who left anonymous gifts both in our mailbox and at our back door.
Dolphins sending birthday cards, giving hugs, rides, and a meal on some very difficult days. This month, dolphins have been everywhere. And I’ve seen them all.
And then there was a whale, of sorts. A bizarre message that I wonder if anyone who misses Myron might take as much comfort in as I do. A medical practitioner who never knew or met Myron, who didn’t know us until she became part of the huge team of people treating us this past year, had a dream. She told us that in all the years she’s practiced, she’s never had a dream involving clients. But this week she did.
She was sent to heaven to deliver a pizza, of all things. Walking down a street that looked like a street in Disneyland, she found herself repeating, “The father of…, the father of…,” not knowing why. She knew she had to find building number 17 and when she did, went inside. The room was filled with people, but she noticed one man in particular and said, “The father of…the father of... Karson! Are you the father of Karson?” She knew it was Myron, and he smiled a big smile and said with great joy, “I am!”
“Are you Myron?” she asked.
“Yes!” he said.
“I know your kids!” she said in amazement. “How are you?”
Myron smiled and said, “I’m doing great!” She realized that he was busy doing a job, that he had been given a job in heaven, not a stuffy office job (her words) but that he was organizing something, socializing with the people around him and that they were all having fun. She realized she was supposed to deliver the pizza to him and after she gave it to him, woke up.
He is well. He is happy. He has been given the task of organizing things, which if you knew Myron, makes more sense than I can explain, and he is enjoying the people around him. She asked Taeryn, “Why would I be delivering pizza?” Taeryn said, “I don’t know…but my dad sure loved it!”
Its funny what you miss, and what you take comfort in. I’m grateful for it all. The other night at supper, Karson dropped his fork and yelled, “I just realized that daddy is talking to JESUS! He’s dancing with Jesus!” He looked at us with huge eyes. “That’s SO cool!”
It is. Not always easy to live with. But so very cool.
_________________________________________________________________
A NOTE: An amazing CD has been written and recorded by the very talented Steve Mitchinson and produced by the incredible Philip Janz, called “Giver of Life”. I wanted to put a link to it here as it is a beautiful collection of original songs designed for those who are in the end-stages of life. Steve Mitchinson is a British physician who now lives in B.C.’s lower mainland and has felt a special calling to care for the palliative. His CD is soothing, thought-provoking, and an oasis in the midst of suffering. I would highly encourage anyone who is either in the end-stages of earthly life or grieving the loss of a loved-one to follow this link. I was asked to write a review for it on Itunes, and it was an honour to do so.
http://itunes.apple.com/ca/album/giver-of-life/id511496718
Wednesday, March 28, 2012
Thank You
Thank you for all the reminders of the many prayers being brought before the throne. You have lifted my feet.
We have been praying for a little boy and his family in Thailand that our Sunday School supports. They disappeared in the massive flooding that took place months ago and we haven't heard anything. Today I woke Taeryn and Karson up to let them know via our children's pastor that the boy and his family had been found and were safe. What a wonderful thing it is to wake up your children with good news. They had been praying for him everyday and were overjoyed.
We are currently praying for several families with huge needs, some who are completely dependent upon God for a miracle. It is a priviledge to be on the other end of the prayer table, to be able to give as well as receive. I am convinced more and more that we have been intricately created to give, to love outside of ourselves. When we don't, something begins to wither inside.
That in mind, there is also something humbling and life-changing about being the recipients of the grace of others. It is a way of being loved that touches the innermost part of the heart, if you let it. I wish that everyone in crisis could be surrounded by the type of kindness and encouragement that we have. It is spiritual life-support, it truly is.
Our winter here on the coast is rainy and gray. The rains begin in October and don't seem to stop, until one day, the sun bursts out of its cloudy prison and enjoys its freedom. Doors open, people venture out, everyone is happier. I noticed that in the two days of warm sunshine, the plants exploded into bloom. Where the week before there was nothing; where it was brown, brittle, and barren; where there was no sign that something could change, now there are buds and blossoms and that intense green colour that comes with new life. How amazing that with merely two days of sunshine and warmth, everything feels different; looks different. It makes me think how just this small thing, this tiny moment in the grand scheme of time, has the ability to pull new life out of something that lies dormant and tired.
Anyways, I just wanted to say thank you. You continue to make it possible to see the power of the Son.
Love,
Gillian
We have been praying for a little boy and his family in Thailand that our Sunday School supports. They disappeared in the massive flooding that took place months ago and we haven't heard anything. Today I woke Taeryn and Karson up to let them know via our children's pastor that the boy and his family had been found and were safe. What a wonderful thing it is to wake up your children with good news. They had been praying for him everyday and were overjoyed.
We are currently praying for several families with huge needs, some who are completely dependent upon God for a miracle. It is a priviledge to be on the other end of the prayer table, to be able to give as well as receive. I am convinced more and more that we have been intricately created to give, to love outside of ourselves. When we don't, something begins to wither inside.
That in mind, there is also something humbling and life-changing about being the recipients of the grace of others. It is a way of being loved that touches the innermost part of the heart, if you let it. I wish that everyone in crisis could be surrounded by the type of kindness and encouragement that we have. It is spiritual life-support, it truly is.
Our winter here on the coast is rainy and gray. The rains begin in October and don't seem to stop, until one day, the sun bursts out of its cloudy prison and enjoys its freedom. Doors open, people venture out, everyone is happier. I noticed that in the two days of warm sunshine, the plants exploded into bloom. Where the week before there was nothing; where it was brown, brittle, and barren; where there was no sign that something could change, now there are buds and blossoms and that intense green colour that comes with new life. How amazing that with merely two days of sunshine and warmth, everything feels different; looks different. It makes me think how just this small thing, this tiny moment in the grand scheme of time, has the ability to pull new life out of something that lies dormant and tired.
Anyways, I just wanted to say thank you. You continue to make it possible to see the power of the Son.
Love,
Gillian
Thursday, March 22, 2012
Evan Almighty
The months since Christmas have been very difficult. I think that for some of my children, the mourning season is really just beginning. It is a healthy thing, a necessary thing, but a difficult thing to watch. The day of the anniversary we watched excerpts of the funeral. It was open to anyone in the family who wanted to, no-one was forced, yet everyone did. And when we saw the slide show, picture after picture of Myron, the dam burst open.
I listened through my own tears as my children and nephews and niece cried. Wailed. Broke wide open. And at one point I thought to myself, this is what hell sounds like. Pure torment. I think it has taken me this long to recover from that day. Maybe I’m still trying to. One of my children had been holding in the grief, the pain, for the entire year. That day, the day we watched the CD of the funeral, it could be held back no longer. The dam broke and I wasn’t sure they would be able to recover from it. The interesting thing is that afterwards, and really since, there is a lightness for this child that wasn’t there before. A weight has been lifted and the grieving can now continue in a healthier way. It reminded me again that it will only be by pressing through the pain, feeling it, admitting it, letting it at times have its way with us, that we can ever hope to breathe again. It is in our nature to fight pain, to end it, to stop it from happening. I think it would be the worse thing to do in this situation. I really do.
I’m sure it must be exhausting for others, to have to relive our situation so often. It is only natural that others are moving past the initial shock and disbelief, they don’t have to face it every minute, which is a good thing. I wonder at the grace they show us, to have to hear me cry again, hear me lament, hear me repeat the same feelings over and over. It is something I hope to remember later in life for others, that need to keep feeling, to keep talking it through until it finally sinks in that its real.
I have been hiding. I am tired of the pain. I am tired of the responsibilities, the unknown, the loneliness, the need for action, and so I have been crawling away, hiding myself and my emotions, filling the air with someone else’s noise so I wouldn’t have to hear my own thoughts. I think there are periods of time where this might be a good thing, a break, but I can see how easy it would be to just keep going, to never resurface. I am at one of those cross-roads where I need to make another difficult choice, the choice to make good choices, to be present.
When discouragement and fear take hold, they are like anchors around my mind. They drag me to a place that is dark and bleak and where there are no answers. It is not a good place.
Karson asked me tonight what faith is. I said it is believing in something you cannot see. He said, “I have faith then. I believe in God even when I can’t see him.” As I write this I am a bit ashamed because in my heart I know that God has been showing himself, and yet my faith is still weak.
Karson, Taeryn and I watched a movie. They picked “Evan Almighty”, a modern day parody of Noah and the building of the ark, starring Steve Carrell and Morgan Freeman. I like that movie. Its entertaining and it has a good message. We’ve watched it a few times over the years. As we played it tonight, I suddenly sat up and told Taeryn to rewind it. I had just heard something I wanted to hear again. Evan had just met God and God begins to reveal who He is. He says, “You’re Evan Baxter, born in (whatever the place was) on JUNE 15, 1962.” This is where I sat up and had Taeryn rewind it. “You know who’s birthday that actually is?” I asked the kids. “Daddy’s. Not just the month and day, but the exact year. This character, Evan, has the exact same birthday as daddy’s.” I marvelled that all the times we had watched it we had never noticed before, and it got me thinking. Just as God knew it would.
When the movie was finished I said to Karson and Taeryn, “I think God was telling us something tonight. We are like Noah. We are in the midst of our own flood. We don’t know why God is allowing this, we don’t know what is going to happen, or how He’s going to take care of us without Daddy. But I think He wants us to remember to trust Him. Just listen and trust Him and He’ll take care of it.” Taeryn said, “Do you think He got the writers to put daddy’s birthday in the movie just so we’d remember that?” Absolutely. He’s way ahead of us. And we all felt encouraged.
Like my wonderful friends and family, God hears my story over and over again. I’m sad; I’m grieving; I’m scared; I’m doubtful; I’m hurting. And like my human listeners, He just lets me tell it over and over again…always listening, always caring. And then He shows himself again. Even after I’ve forgotten, even after my faith has dwindled, even after I allow the fear and discouragement to entwine my thinking…He reminds me again to trust Him. Just trust Him. He’s way ahead.
I shared with a friend today that I am terrified that people will stop praying for us and she said, “Write that on the blog. Let people know, they need to know that.” So I am. Things have gotten rocky and we are waiting on so many things beyond our control. All I have is my fickle faith and the prayers of His body. I know many are still praying, it is at times the only thing that gets me through the night. Forgive me for not trusting in His people, those He has called to walk this road with us, and bless you for lifting us up to the One who has promised, again, that He will make a way.
With love and thankfulness,
Gillian
*I ask for prayer for Bryn (with her permission). This is a difficult time for her. I think her grief is raw, she is really missing her dad, and the weight of what’s ahead cannot be easy. We were dealt with a bit of a blow recently when through a routine ultrasound we found out she has a birth defect that will most likely require a priority surgery. It is outside the issues of the accident, although the anaemia she is suffering from as a result of the accident is making things worse. It is another surgery and another group of specialists on top of what she is already facing and I couldn’t believe it was happening. How much can an eleven year old girl take, I asked God? This surgery takes precedence over her upcoming leg surgery, although B.C. anaesthetists are threatening strike action on April 1st, so there is more red tape to wade through. She is in constant pain and I think that pain is wearing on her. We will continue to look for where God will act in this.
I listened through my own tears as my children and nephews and niece cried. Wailed. Broke wide open. And at one point I thought to myself, this is what hell sounds like. Pure torment. I think it has taken me this long to recover from that day. Maybe I’m still trying to. One of my children had been holding in the grief, the pain, for the entire year. That day, the day we watched the CD of the funeral, it could be held back no longer. The dam broke and I wasn’t sure they would be able to recover from it. The interesting thing is that afterwards, and really since, there is a lightness for this child that wasn’t there before. A weight has been lifted and the grieving can now continue in a healthier way. It reminded me again that it will only be by pressing through the pain, feeling it, admitting it, letting it at times have its way with us, that we can ever hope to breathe again. It is in our nature to fight pain, to end it, to stop it from happening. I think it would be the worse thing to do in this situation. I really do.
I’m sure it must be exhausting for others, to have to relive our situation so often. It is only natural that others are moving past the initial shock and disbelief, they don’t have to face it every minute, which is a good thing. I wonder at the grace they show us, to have to hear me cry again, hear me lament, hear me repeat the same feelings over and over. It is something I hope to remember later in life for others, that need to keep feeling, to keep talking it through until it finally sinks in that its real.
I have been hiding. I am tired of the pain. I am tired of the responsibilities, the unknown, the loneliness, the need for action, and so I have been crawling away, hiding myself and my emotions, filling the air with someone else’s noise so I wouldn’t have to hear my own thoughts. I think there are periods of time where this might be a good thing, a break, but I can see how easy it would be to just keep going, to never resurface. I am at one of those cross-roads where I need to make another difficult choice, the choice to make good choices, to be present.
When discouragement and fear take hold, they are like anchors around my mind. They drag me to a place that is dark and bleak and where there are no answers. It is not a good place.
Karson asked me tonight what faith is. I said it is believing in something you cannot see. He said, “I have faith then. I believe in God even when I can’t see him.” As I write this I am a bit ashamed because in my heart I know that God has been showing himself, and yet my faith is still weak.
Karson, Taeryn and I watched a movie. They picked “Evan Almighty”, a modern day parody of Noah and the building of the ark, starring Steve Carrell and Morgan Freeman. I like that movie. Its entertaining and it has a good message. We’ve watched it a few times over the years. As we played it tonight, I suddenly sat up and told Taeryn to rewind it. I had just heard something I wanted to hear again. Evan had just met God and God begins to reveal who He is. He says, “You’re Evan Baxter, born in (whatever the place was) on JUNE 15, 1962.” This is where I sat up and had Taeryn rewind it. “You know who’s birthday that actually is?” I asked the kids. “Daddy’s. Not just the month and day, but the exact year. This character, Evan, has the exact same birthday as daddy’s.” I marvelled that all the times we had watched it we had never noticed before, and it got me thinking. Just as God knew it would.
When the movie was finished I said to Karson and Taeryn, “I think God was telling us something tonight. We are like Noah. We are in the midst of our own flood. We don’t know why God is allowing this, we don’t know what is going to happen, or how He’s going to take care of us without Daddy. But I think He wants us to remember to trust Him. Just listen and trust Him and He’ll take care of it.” Taeryn said, “Do you think He got the writers to put daddy’s birthday in the movie just so we’d remember that?” Absolutely. He’s way ahead of us. And we all felt encouraged.
Like my wonderful friends and family, God hears my story over and over again. I’m sad; I’m grieving; I’m scared; I’m doubtful; I’m hurting. And like my human listeners, He just lets me tell it over and over again…always listening, always caring. And then He shows himself again. Even after I’ve forgotten, even after my faith has dwindled, even after I allow the fear and discouragement to entwine my thinking…He reminds me again to trust Him. Just trust Him. He’s way ahead.
I shared with a friend today that I am terrified that people will stop praying for us and she said, “Write that on the blog. Let people know, they need to know that.” So I am. Things have gotten rocky and we are waiting on so many things beyond our control. All I have is my fickle faith and the prayers of His body. I know many are still praying, it is at times the only thing that gets me through the night. Forgive me for not trusting in His people, those He has called to walk this road with us, and bless you for lifting us up to the One who has promised, again, that He will make a way.
With love and thankfulness,
Gillian
*I ask for prayer for Bryn (with her permission). This is a difficult time for her. I think her grief is raw, she is really missing her dad, and the weight of what’s ahead cannot be easy. We were dealt with a bit of a blow recently when through a routine ultrasound we found out she has a birth defect that will most likely require a priority surgery. It is outside the issues of the accident, although the anaemia she is suffering from as a result of the accident is making things worse. It is another surgery and another group of specialists on top of what she is already facing and I couldn’t believe it was happening. How much can an eleven year old girl take, I asked God? This surgery takes precedence over her upcoming leg surgery, although B.C. anaesthetists are threatening strike action on April 1st, so there is more red tape to wade through. She is in constant pain and I think that pain is wearing on her. We will continue to look for where God will act in this.
Wednesday, March 14, 2012
Chick Flicks and Intrigue
I am sitting in bed staring at this blank page. Sometimes I hold so much in that when its time to let it out, I can’t find the beginning. Especially when I’m numb. Today, I think, I’m just numb. (Not numb enough, however, to ignore the two kids who instead of going to sleep are fooling around on the other side of my wall. I’ve thumped twice and have given a verbal warning.)
There is a delicate balance between holding things in place and completely unravelling. For the past few weeks, I’ve been unravelling. I haven’t been sleeping, I’ve felt anxious and tired and afraid. I’ve been wanting to avoid things and I told the psychologist that I am fearing for my health, that I wasn’t doing well and then came home and felt even worse.
I’m running out of endurance.
I love detective shows. I don’t know why and I’ve been pondering this for the past few days. What is it about these mysteries that I enjoy so much? I haven’t reached a solid conclusion yet, but it may be the fact that I like answers. I like to know “why”. I like to know “how”. I like to know the “because”. These shows and books give me the chance to figure it out. And if I don’t, I can be assured that they’ll do it for me in the last five minutes, or by page 429.
I liked watching movies with Myron. He loved “chick flicks”…the romantic comedies where everything worked out beautifully in the end; the couple gets together, everything is resolved, happy, happy, happy. Chick flicks and sports movies. Sometimes he would find one that combined the two, which was a real bonus.
I liked intrigue and adventure. I enjoy trying to figure out what’s happening, who’s who and really good plot twists. Watching comedies, action and sports movies with Myron was great, but I have to admit that I didn’t always like watching the intrigue ones with him. Because he could never figure out what was going on.
“I don‘t understand what happening!” he’d say, all disgusted.
“It’s only two minutes into the show,” I’d hiss, “NO-ONE understands what’s happening. That the point.”
Some silence, then, “Well, where did that guy come from? What’s he doing?”
I’d reach for the pause button, explain what I knew, then restart the movie.
“I don’t get it. Why’s he building that bomb?”
Pause. Explain. Restart.
“WAIT! Rewind that part, I didn’t hear what he said!”
Gillian: “He said, ’No!’ That’s it. You didn’t miss anything.”
“Just rewind it,” he’d insist, “I just want to make sure.”
“Can we just keep going, please, he seriously just said ‘no’ to her and now she’s jumping on that motorcycle.”
“Let me rewind it, it’ll only take a second!”
Rewind.
Actor: “No!”
Myron: “Oh.”
Gillian: “I told you! Can we watch now?”
Myron: “Yep. Keep going.”
Silence.
Myron: “Do you like this?”
Gillian: “What? This movie?”
Myron: “Yeah, the movie. Do you think its good?”
Gillian: “It could be good. If I could watch it.”
Myron: “Hey, wait! What did that girl say to him? It could be important! Rewind it!”
He wasn‘t incapable of figuring it out, he was just a slow processor. He needed time to put things together, needed all the facts at once to make the big picture.
I jump on things quickly. I tend to use assumptions and inferences to come up with a theory then wait to see if it was right, adjusting it as more information comes to light. Great for watching movies. Not always great for living life.
My point (if I can find one) is that I like to have answers. I like to look for them, analyze them, mull them over. Myron hated movies that ended badly, ones that left you sad or the couple doesn’t get together, or the dog dies. I hated the ones that left things in ambiguity; those artsy endings that forced you to decide on your own what the characters might do, instead of just telling us. Endings like that kept me up at night.
Maybe that’s why doing life right now is so difficult. God has allowed the ending of the story to be changed with no solid clues about the future. That’s not a good place for a big-picture, answer-seeking, over-analyzing type of person. Like me.
And so when I say that I was unravelling, I mean it. Things were not good in this mixed up, exhausted brain of mine. And I was worried.
I decided long ago that there was only one way I was going to have any hope of functioning: It was to stop thinking ahead and focus on the now. A cliché really, but I knew it was all I could handle. So in the hospital I began breaking our life into chunks: Step one was to get us out of the hospital and home again. That’s as far as I tried to look. Any farther was too overwhelming. Step two was to get all the kids walking; Step three was to organize our physio/medical appointments. Step four was to get term one of school finished. And so on. And so on.
But then, recently, something out of the blue yanked my head up and pointed ahead to the future and I looked. And once I looked I forgot to stop looking and I began to stare. And as I stared I began to crumble with the weight of the responsibilities and the unknown and the seemingly impossibility of finances and schedules and Bryn’s surgeries and the loneliness, and suddenly I was being crushed with the circumstances. I took my eyes off the now. It was a bad move.
I was sharing this with a friend and suddenly I began to laugh. She asked me what was so funny. I said, “This is how bad it got. I’ve been thinking about jobs for the kids. What if we don’t have enough money for university? What if they flunk out? What if they don’t find a job they like? What if they don’t find jobs at all? And the economy is bad, what if they end up with nowhere to live, or not making ends meet? And who knows if there will still be any kind of old age pension plan when they’re old, how are they going to live, to get their medicines, pay their heating bills? What are they going to do?” Yep, I was definitely trying to figure out the ending well before the details. My romantic comedy has become an drama/intrigue and I’m having trouble making the switch. Maybe I’m more like Myron than I realized.
I had a picture in my heart that I shared with another friend shortly before the accident. It was of me trying to follow Jesus. I kept looking to see where he was, looking to see which direction he was pointing me in, and I couldn’t find him. It worried me that I couldn’t see him. And then suddenly he was beside me and pointing in front of me, showing me a footprint in the ground just ahead. It was his, and as I looked it began to harden like it was set in concrete, and he said, “Just look for my footprint, and step into it. That’s all you have to do.” I think how incredibly wise it was of him to tell me that before I needed it the most, because it has been the key to survival.
I look for the next footprint. And I step into it. And he’s there.
There is a delicate balance between holding things in place and completely unravelling. For the past few weeks, I’ve been unravelling. I haven’t been sleeping, I’ve felt anxious and tired and afraid. I’ve been wanting to avoid things and I told the psychologist that I am fearing for my health, that I wasn’t doing well and then came home and felt even worse.
I’m running out of endurance.
I love detective shows. I don’t know why and I’ve been pondering this for the past few days. What is it about these mysteries that I enjoy so much? I haven’t reached a solid conclusion yet, but it may be the fact that I like answers. I like to know “why”. I like to know “how”. I like to know the “because”. These shows and books give me the chance to figure it out. And if I don’t, I can be assured that they’ll do it for me in the last five minutes, or by page 429.
I liked watching movies with Myron. He loved “chick flicks”…the romantic comedies where everything worked out beautifully in the end; the couple gets together, everything is resolved, happy, happy, happy. Chick flicks and sports movies. Sometimes he would find one that combined the two, which was a real bonus.
I liked intrigue and adventure. I enjoy trying to figure out what’s happening, who’s who and really good plot twists. Watching comedies, action and sports movies with Myron was great, but I have to admit that I didn’t always like watching the intrigue ones with him. Because he could never figure out what was going on.
“I don‘t understand what happening!” he’d say, all disgusted.
“It’s only two minutes into the show,” I’d hiss, “NO-ONE understands what’s happening. That the point.”
Some silence, then, “Well, where did that guy come from? What’s he doing?”
I’d reach for the pause button, explain what I knew, then restart the movie.
“I don’t get it. Why’s he building that bomb?”
Pause. Explain. Restart.
“WAIT! Rewind that part, I didn’t hear what he said!”
Gillian: “He said, ’No!’ That’s it. You didn’t miss anything.”
“Just rewind it,” he’d insist, “I just want to make sure.”
“Can we just keep going, please, he seriously just said ‘no’ to her and now she’s jumping on that motorcycle.”
“Let me rewind it, it’ll only take a second!”
Rewind.
Actor: “No!”
Myron: “Oh.”
Gillian: “I told you! Can we watch now?”
Myron: “Yep. Keep going.”
Silence.
Myron: “Do you like this?”
Gillian: “What? This movie?”
Myron: “Yeah, the movie. Do you think its good?”
Gillian: “It could be good. If I could watch it.”
Myron: “Hey, wait! What did that girl say to him? It could be important! Rewind it!”
He wasn‘t incapable of figuring it out, he was just a slow processor. He needed time to put things together, needed all the facts at once to make the big picture.
I jump on things quickly. I tend to use assumptions and inferences to come up with a theory then wait to see if it was right, adjusting it as more information comes to light. Great for watching movies. Not always great for living life.
My point (if I can find one) is that I like to have answers. I like to look for them, analyze them, mull them over. Myron hated movies that ended badly, ones that left you sad or the couple doesn’t get together, or the dog dies. I hated the ones that left things in ambiguity; those artsy endings that forced you to decide on your own what the characters might do, instead of just telling us. Endings like that kept me up at night.
Maybe that’s why doing life right now is so difficult. God has allowed the ending of the story to be changed with no solid clues about the future. That’s not a good place for a big-picture, answer-seeking, over-analyzing type of person. Like me.
And so when I say that I was unravelling, I mean it. Things were not good in this mixed up, exhausted brain of mine. And I was worried.
I decided long ago that there was only one way I was going to have any hope of functioning: It was to stop thinking ahead and focus on the now. A cliché really, but I knew it was all I could handle. So in the hospital I began breaking our life into chunks: Step one was to get us out of the hospital and home again. That’s as far as I tried to look. Any farther was too overwhelming. Step two was to get all the kids walking; Step three was to organize our physio/medical appointments. Step four was to get term one of school finished. And so on. And so on.
But then, recently, something out of the blue yanked my head up and pointed ahead to the future and I looked. And once I looked I forgot to stop looking and I began to stare. And as I stared I began to crumble with the weight of the responsibilities and the unknown and the seemingly impossibility of finances and schedules and Bryn’s surgeries and the loneliness, and suddenly I was being crushed with the circumstances. I took my eyes off the now. It was a bad move.
I was sharing this with a friend and suddenly I began to laugh. She asked me what was so funny. I said, “This is how bad it got. I’ve been thinking about jobs for the kids. What if we don’t have enough money for university? What if they flunk out? What if they don’t find a job they like? What if they don’t find jobs at all? And the economy is bad, what if they end up with nowhere to live, or not making ends meet? And who knows if there will still be any kind of old age pension plan when they’re old, how are they going to live, to get their medicines, pay their heating bills? What are they going to do?” Yep, I was definitely trying to figure out the ending well before the details. My romantic comedy has become an drama/intrigue and I’m having trouble making the switch. Maybe I’m more like Myron than I realized.
I had a picture in my heart that I shared with another friend shortly before the accident. It was of me trying to follow Jesus. I kept looking to see where he was, looking to see which direction he was pointing me in, and I couldn’t find him. It worried me that I couldn’t see him. And then suddenly he was beside me and pointing in front of me, showing me a footprint in the ground just ahead. It was his, and as I looked it began to harden like it was set in concrete, and he said, “Just look for my footprint, and step into it. That’s all you have to do.” I think how incredibly wise it was of him to tell me that before I needed it the most, because it has been the key to survival.
I look for the next footprint. And I step into it. And he’s there.
Friday, February 17, 2012
Here I Am
We continue with our heavy schedule of appointments and physiotherapy and schoolwork and life.
I find it interesting that as we look back at our recent trip, it is the best moments that rise to the top of our conversation. Even Bryn, who had such pain and was hit with the flu, comments on the moments she enjoyed. The negative things have already faded a degree and the things we want to remember have taken precedence.
I find that my life memories have generally followed this same pattern. I look at all the scrapbooks I’ve made throughout the years, and even though there were things I remember that were truly awful, it is the good things I’ve put on paper. And when Myron died, I didn’t sit around thinking, “I just wish I could have taught him to put away his dirty dishes before he left.” I don’t spend much time obsessing about the things that frustrated me or the parts of his personality that at times caused me to look at him and think, “I went into this marriage willingly???” It is the things I appreciate about him that rise to the surface. The good memories, the things I am grateful for. The parts of him that brought us joy.
It is difficult to believe in joy when you are devastated. I can believe in provision; I can believe in God’s goodness; I can believe in mercy. I struggle to believe in the joy of living. Will I ever truly again feel the joy of being alive? Will I ever go to bed at night believing, “Life is good!”? It seems…improbable. From this vantage point. But I know that this vantage point is not the only vantage point I will ever have. So maybe there is hope.
I watched Taeryn and Karson try something they’ve never tried before - downhill skiing. They have lessons through the school we are associated with and have done 2 out of 4 of them. The most difficult thing about it (besides the fear that they might hurt themselves) is that we have to drive by the accident scene both there and on the way back, something I had decided I would never do again. I was planning on cutting out that piece of Canada and pretending it didn’t exist, but that would mean denying the kids the opportunity to try this new sport and that didn‘t seem right either. And so we make the trip out to Hemlock Valley. And I’m glad we do.
I am not a skier. I tried it a few times many years ago, but I could never achieve that graceful, flowing, skis tight together, swooshing down the hill look. I was more the “out-of-control-I’m-so-sorry-I-didn’t-mean-to-run-my-skis-over-your-face” type of skier. When Karson and Taeryn got their little skis and we headed out the door to the bunny slope, I thought, “I am so thankful they get the chance to learn this now.” That was until I got their skis on. First of all, I was trying to get it through their heads that anytime you point a ski DOWNHILL, forwards or backwards, you will slide that direction---its called gravity. Then I explained that the instructor would be out shortly and they would have a lesson, something that Taeryn didn’t hear, because she took one look at the bunny tow and yelled, “I want to go on THAT!!” Karson took that moment to forget the skis-that-point-downhill-go-downhill rule and as I ran to try and stop him from sliding into the wall of the lodge, Taeryn took the opportunity to crawl over to the tow, grab a bar, and begin up the hill. I turned around to see her half way up, hanging on for dear life. Discarding Karson in a snowdrift, I began charging up the slope after her, yelling, “Taeryn, stop! YOU DON’T KNOW HOW TO SKI!” Being that I am not an Olympic athlete, she obviously beat me to the top of the slope, pointed her skis straight down and took off, passing me at a breakneck speed, a smile plastered all over her face. As she shot by I turned and began yelling after her, “PIZZA! PIZZA!” (meaning put your skis in a pizza shape to slow down … which meant absolutely nothing to her because SHE HADN’T HAD A LESSON YET!) I watched helplessly as she kamikazied to the bottom, realized that she had no idea how to stop herself, flipped herself on her side and slid to a stop. The tow operator ran over, picked her up, dusted her off, and as I was running back down the hill, I heard her yell, “I want to do that again!”
This time I made it clear she was to wait for an actual teacher, not a mother running after her yelling meaningless food references, and they began their real lesson. And after a few shaky runs and my thinking, “Alright…this is obviously NOT their sport,” they amazed me by suddenly learning to turn, to stop, and the rest was unbelievable. My little ones could ski! And they loved it.
I felt a lot of things that day. To watch children who were once so injured and torn they couldn’t move do something as physical as skiing, was amazing. To watch them do it well, was incredible. To watch them do it well and loving it…heart-soaring. And I felt joy.
A woman I know shared with me her life story of losing a baby to SIDS and a grand-daughter to a brain aneurism and the depression she felt afterwards. “I didn’t want to live,” she said. Even having three other children didn’t do it. She just didn’t want to continue this dreadfully inconsistent thing we call life.
And then her son graduated from High School and she went to the ceremony where she was suddenly filled with such pride and happiness at his accomplishment that she thought if she had ended it back then, walked away from life like she had wanted to, was tempted to, she would have missed all of this. This moment. This wonderful time of watching the son she loved accomplish something that was important to him, and feeling the wonder of it. I remember thinking, if nothing else, Gillian, try to remember all the things you would miss.
Like watching Karson and Taeryn ski for the first time.
Like watching Bryn dance for the first time since the accident at the Remembrance Night we had last month for Myron, and the church full of people that wept with me at the sight of it.
Like watching Lauren perform solo with a Live Band for the first time and blowing me away.
There is joy out there. And I will feel it.
However, I cannot deny the fact that a good deal of my energy is spent trying to find the motivation to keep on living. A friend sat down after church with me and said that every time I smiled it was like a gift to him; that he wanted more than anything for me to be able to suck the marrow out of life…to enjoy what there is. There is probably a place within where I want that too. But it is difficult. And so I am profoundly grateful when the joy is brought to me, like a little gift left on my doorstep, instead of me having to go find it myself. Maybe one day I will have to start searching for it on my own, but for now it feels like God’s grace; rain on a desert spirit.
I was driving home the other night, and the song lyrics, “Here I am to worship, here I am to bow down, here I am to say that you’re my God,” came to my lips. I sang them over a few times and was suddenly struck with the profound belief that God was giving me my “blue-prints”; my directions. I struggle to understand the greater purpose of why I am still here. I heard of a tragic accident last week where the entire family was killed, and I admit, shockingly and horrifyingly…I was envious. Envious that there was no-one to stay behind, longing for something they could no longer have, tormented by a loss of every moment of every day. (Of course I realize that all their extended family and friends would suffer the loss, as would mine. But it is the thought that rushed to mind.) My soul keeps crying out for meaning, for direction, for some sort of understanding that I could hold on to, and I was stranded in a sea of not knowing…until that moment.
Because, I am here to worship.
Because, I am here to bow down.
Because, I am here to say that despite everything, in the midst of my questions, my fear, my anger, my confusion: You are my God. I will declare that You are MY GOD. And if that is all, then that is enough. For now.
I find it interesting that as we look back at our recent trip, it is the best moments that rise to the top of our conversation. Even Bryn, who had such pain and was hit with the flu, comments on the moments she enjoyed. The negative things have already faded a degree and the things we want to remember have taken precedence.
I find that my life memories have generally followed this same pattern. I look at all the scrapbooks I’ve made throughout the years, and even though there were things I remember that were truly awful, it is the good things I’ve put on paper. And when Myron died, I didn’t sit around thinking, “I just wish I could have taught him to put away his dirty dishes before he left.” I don’t spend much time obsessing about the things that frustrated me or the parts of his personality that at times caused me to look at him and think, “I went into this marriage willingly???” It is the things I appreciate about him that rise to the surface. The good memories, the things I am grateful for. The parts of him that brought us joy.
It is difficult to believe in joy when you are devastated. I can believe in provision; I can believe in God’s goodness; I can believe in mercy. I struggle to believe in the joy of living. Will I ever truly again feel the joy of being alive? Will I ever go to bed at night believing, “Life is good!”? It seems…improbable. From this vantage point. But I know that this vantage point is not the only vantage point I will ever have. So maybe there is hope.
I watched Taeryn and Karson try something they’ve never tried before - downhill skiing. They have lessons through the school we are associated with and have done 2 out of 4 of them. The most difficult thing about it (besides the fear that they might hurt themselves) is that we have to drive by the accident scene both there and on the way back, something I had decided I would never do again. I was planning on cutting out that piece of Canada and pretending it didn’t exist, but that would mean denying the kids the opportunity to try this new sport and that didn‘t seem right either. And so we make the trip out to Hemlock Valley. And I’m glad we do.
I am not a skier. I tried it a few times many years ago, but I could never achieve that graceful, flowing, skis tight together, swooshing down the hill look. I was more the “out-of-control-I’m-so-sorry-I-didn’t-mean-to-run-my-skis-over-your-face” type of skier. When Karson and Taeryn got their little skis and we headed out the door to the bunny slope, I thought, “I am so thankful they get the chance to learn this now.” That was until I got their skis on. First of all, I was trying to get it through their heads that anytime you point a ski DOWNHILL, forwards or backwards, you will slide that direction---its called gravity. Then I explained that the instructor would be out shortly and they would have a lesson, something that Taeryn didn’t hear, because she took one look at the bunny tow and yelled, “I want to go on THAT!!” Karson took that moment to forget the skis-that-point-downhill-go-downhill rule and as I ran to try and stop him from sliding into the wall of the lodge, Taeryn took the opportunity to crawl over to the tow, grab a bar, and begin up the hill. I turned around to see her half way up, hanging on for dear life. Discarding Karson in a snowdrift, I began charging up the slope after her, yelling, “Taeryn, stop! YOU DON’T KNOW HOW TO SKI!” Being that I am not an Olympic athlete, she obviously beat me to the top of the slope, pointed her skis straight down and took off, passing me at a breakneck speed, a smile plastered all over her face. As she shot by I turned and began yelling after her, “PIZZA! PIZZA!” (meaning put your skis in a pizza shape to slow down … which meant absolutely nothing to her because SHE HADN’T HAD A LESSON YET!) I watched helplessly as she kamikazied to the bottom, realized that she had no idea how to stop herself, flipped herself on her side and slid to a stop. The tow operator ran over, picked her up, dusted her off, and as I was running back down the hill, I heard her yell, “I want to do that again!”
This time I made it clear she was to wait for an actual teacher, not a mother running after her yelling meaningless food references, and they began their real lesson. And after a few shaky runs and my thinking, “Alright…this is obviously NOT their sport,” they amazed me by suddenly learning to turn, to stop, and the rest was unbelievable. My little ones could ski! And they loved it.
I felt a lot of things that day. To watch children who were once so injured and torn they couldn’t move do something as physical as skiing, was amazing. To watch them do it well, was incredible. To watch them do it well and loving it…heart-soaring. And I felt joy.
A woman I know shared with me her life story of losing a baby to SIDS and a grand-daughter to a brain aneurism and the depression she felt afterwards. “I didn’t want to live,” she said. Even having three other children didn’t do it. She just didn’t want to continue this dreadfully inconsistent thing we call life.
And then her son graduated from High School and she went to the ceremony where she was suddenly filled with such pride and happiness at his accomplishment that she thought if she had ended it back then, walked away from life like she had wanted to, was tempted to, she would have missed all of this. This moment. This wonderful time of watching the son she loved accomplish something that was important to him, and feeling the wonder of it. I remember thinking, if nothing else, Gillian, try to remember all the things you would miss.
Like watching Karson and Taeryn ski for the first time.
Like watching Bryn dance for the first time since the accident at the Remembrance Night we had last month for Myron, and the church full of people that wept with me at the sight of it.
Like watching Lauren perform solo with a Live Band for the first time and blowing me away.
There is joy out there. And I will feel it.
However, I cannot deny the fact that a good deal of my energy is spent trying to find the motivation to keep on living. A friend sat down after church with me and said that every time I smiled it was like a gift to him; that he wanted more than anything for me to be able to suck the marrow out of life…to enjoy what there is. There is probably a place within where I want that too. But it is difficult. And so I am profoundly grateful when the joy is brought to me, like a little gift left on my doorstep, instead of me having to go find it myself. Maybe one day I will have to start searching for it on my own, but for now it feels like God’s grace; rain on a desert spirit.
I was driving home the other night, and the song lyrics, “Here I am to worship, here I am to bow down, here I am to say that you’re my God,” came to my lips. I sang them over a few times and was suddenly struck with the profound belief that God was giving me my “blue-prints”; my directions. I struggle to understand the greater purpose of why I am still here. I heard of a tragic accident last week where the entire family was killed, and I admit, shockingly and horrifyingly…I was envious. Envious that there was no-one to stay behind, longing for something they could no longer have, tormented by a loss of every moment of every day. (Of course I realize that all their extended family and friends would suffer the loss, as would mine. But it is the thought that rushed to mind.) My soul keeps crying out for meaning, for direction, for some sort of understanding that I could hold on to, and I was stranded in a sea of not knowing…until that moment.
Because, I am here to worship.
Because, I am here to bow down.
Because, I am here to say that despite everything, in the midst of my questions, my fear, my anger, my confusion: You are my God. I will declare that You are MY GOD. And if that is all, then that is enough. For now.
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