I had a dream…….

I landed here in this place through no fault of my own, but because my body no longer cooperates with what I want it to do. The only thing is, nobody has told me the rules. There are people who skim in and out briskly. They give me things but they are not my things.

It is morning now and I miss my coffee. My kitchen. I miss having the whole pot if I want it. I am given a plastic cup with coffee but it’s lukewarm. And weak. I have never drank lukewarm in my whole life, and I never drank it from a plastic cup. I can’t heat it so I leave it……but then I think maybe if I don’t drink it now I may not get it again. Grimacing, I drink it down.

I remember the days when I was mobile. I never thought about getting up and walking across the room, I just did it. I try not to be terrified. This feeling of helplessness is new and strange and I feel trapped. Things are in disarray here……plates left on tables, and no one asks me where I want to sit at breakfast they just push me to the table. What’s more, they don’t give us anything to drink with our food. It’s difficult to eat with nothing to wash it down. I ask them, and they bring it but by then my food is no longer hot. I look around and see if everyone looks as bewildered as I feel.

A dish of ice-cream at lunch sits melted. She is sitting too far from the table and she misses her mouth. He is fiddling with his napkin, tearing it into bits like shrapnel it falls to the floor.

Where am I? Where is the place I used to call home?

I miss my dog and cat. I can’t think where they are now, it hurts too much. Tears course down and I wish I had a Kleenex but I use my sleeve. How I would give anything to feel their soft fur under my hand, see the love and loyalty in their eyes. How they would comfort me here.

I told someone I needed to go to the bathroom but that was hours ago. I have been reduced to wearing those adult diapers. The ones I used to see on those awful commercials. I never thought I would have to wear these. They are soaked through. It’s been hours and still they don’t come.

I dread the time I will need a shower. That’s the worst. I try not to think about it much. In my room are things I know. They spark memories, good ones. I surround myself with those now. I say a prayer of thanks for those. They are like pearls on a string and my mind caresses each one. For many here memory draws no comfort. They only have today. In a way, I envy them.

I watch the staff and see their anguished faces. I don’t imagine they make very much money here. I wonder what they go home to. They sit in corners and huddle up in groups peering into their phones. And yet, I find compassion in some of those eyes. They don’t think they will ever have to be in a place like this. And yet in their eyes I see a helplessness also. We are not so different. When it’s all said and done, we are all doing the best we can.

Night is falling and I dream and it’s long ago and my Dad comes and I can walk again. We walk far, past the grounds, through big buildings and streets and I am free again. He is my rescuer again, just like when I was very small.

I awake and I forget where I am. There are shadows in the corners and unfamiliar sounds. Bumps in the night.

I turn over to find my Bible on the nightstand which comes from home and a warmth washes over me. My life lies between the pages and it rushes out to greet me when I open it. I am home. And in my mind flows free with the songs I learned in church so long ago. I am so thankful they have never left me.

I am not alone. My eyes fill with tears at the wealth of this knowledge and my being is flooded with that realization. Joy finds me.

I am not alone. The Holy Spirit whispers and I want to shout it out!

I marvel that it’s possible that I have something to give here. Something to teach them. Something that sorrow and years and weakness can never take away. Someone to introduce them to.

I breathe a prayer. “Make me your instrument, Lord. Even in this place.”

Soon I will be going Home.

A dream I had last night sparked this post, and when I read my Sarah Young devotional today, I was amazed. Here is part of that reading:

Some of the greatest works of my Kingdom have been done from sick beds and prison cells. Instead of resenting the limitations of a weakened body, search for My way in the midst of these very circumstances.

One of the best decisions I made so far this year…..(I think)

I’ve been involved in fitness one way or another for about 30 years now but I’ve never joined a gym. I’ve done Jazzercise, I’ve run, I’ve walked, I’ve hiked, I’ve cycled some. But I’ve never signed on that dotted line of commitment. Until this year. I had been dragging myself to the treadmill, “dreadmill” as I dubbed it at our clubhouse, but I had been doing it less and less. I hike, which is something I really love to do, but it’s not always convenient to drive to the trail.

We’ve all heard the clichés:

Gyms are meatmarkets.

Why should I pay for what I can do at home?

And what if I get suckered into a membership and I never use it?

Not to mention all those machines, just looking at them is intimidating.

E and I went to check out, Planet Fitness and right away, I got a good positive vibe there. The music was playing, they had flat screens lining the walls right above the treadmills and ellipticals with places for headphone jacks. And I loved the philosophy of the place. They are big on promoting a friendly, “Judgement-free zone” where regular people can come and work out at their own level and enjoy themselves. So far everyone has been very friendly and helpful and it’s a relaxing, welcoming atmosphere which I really appreciate.

Of course, no gym is perfect because it’s made up of people. But so far I have to say I have been very happy with it. Being on the treadmill there is so much different because there are people to watch, music playing, and sights and sounds you don’t have in a closed room. I need that stimulation. And no one pushes you at any piece of equipment because there are plenty to go around. You can take your time and go slowly. No one is breathing down your neck.

The other day there was a lady right next to me who had to be 75. And I saw plenty of people between 30-50. And teens and twenties too.

So far, I can say I am very happy I joined. I did a one year membership because I know me, if I paid for something, I will use it. Added incentive.

The nice thing is, you can also join for just $10 a month, no commitment. The best thing is, I am looking forward to my workout time again, and I had missed that.

There has been much study done about the importance of the mind, body, spirit connection and the importance of all three working together. I really believe this is true. God made our bodies to move, to do physical work. If we don’t keep our bodies healthy we won’t be much good to those who are counting on us. Who love us and want us around for a long time. Another way I can honor God is by honoring the body He gave me.

In a way, taking care of the body He gave me is another way to worship and serve Him, not me.

Everything in moderation.

Once, I was a slave to my exercise routine. If I missed a session it was the end of the world, no more. I have found there is a beauty in balance. It’s okay to take time out for you. Sometimes, in fact, taking that time out for you is one of the best things you can do for the people you love!

If you have ever thought about joining a gym or hiring a personal trainer, I would encourage you to check it out.

Why it’s good to take a break from the computer

Trying to keep up with all the activities associated with blogging and social media sometimes makes me feel as worn out as this woman on the bench. Sometimes I pull away voluntarily, but sometimes, like recently it’s a forced break due to circumstances beyond my control.

After disconnecting the land-line, we decided to have another more improved line installed for internet access only. It won’t be installed until Monday. So…….I have been sitting it out from the sidelines. I have posted a few times from work but at home I have only been dipping in and out, via my phone.

It all gets so exhausting. And sometimes I look at the Facebook ticker tape and it looks so darn loud and busy, almost as if it’s screaming at me. That’s when I know I need to take a break.

So I have been doing some other things instead. I have been taking bike rides, and I even wrote out some note cards for people just because.

I have been observing, a lot.

I talked to my Aunt last light instead of getting on the computer and we laughed over the phone about things going on in her life and mine. I could hear that she really appreciated the call, and I was blessed too. She amazes me. At 80 she sounds as young as she did at 60. She goes to the rest home three times a day to see her husband who will never come out. She calls it her part-time job and it makes her happy to be there for him.

She has a lot of courage. My Mom says when she was a girl she refused to ride the bus to school so my Grandpa bought her a Victory bike and she braved mean country dogs that chased her. She rode for miles to and from school. She had her tonsils out with no anesthesia, and she is a breast cancer survivor.

We talked of Heaven and how we will all be together once again, and whole……..and how He will wipe our tears away forever. No more cancer, no more dementia, or Alzheimer’s, or death.

Or computers, I guess.

Somehow I don’t think I will miss it then.

photo courtesy of creative commons, some rights reserved.

God and the Brandenburg Concerto

This I recall to my mind, therefore have I hope…….It is of the Lord’s mercies that we are not consumed, because his compassions fail not. They are new every morning: great is thy faithfulness.The Lord is my portion, saith my soul; therefore will I hope in him. The Lord is good unto them that wait for him, to the soul that seeketh him. It is good that a man should both hope and quietly wait for the salvation of the Lord. Lamentations 3:21-26

Ever feel like the ground has suddenly shifted beneath your feet?

Like a great seismic shift happened somewhere and everyone got the memo but you and you feel like you’re free-falling through your own life?

Trying to walk backwards on a moving sidewalk?

You feel attacked by the “never wills…..” All of a sudden you know that some things in this life “never will” happen again……the train left and took your youth with it.

One minute you had your feet firmly planted on those sands of time and while you weren’t looking the tide came and took it out from under your feet and swept most of it out to sea.

Don’t be alarmed. This is a normal part of being human. Of living in an ever-changing culture, a time-stamped world.

When I feel that out of control falling feeling……..the one thing that helps me the most is to be reminded that God will never, ever change. When God is your anchor, you don’t have to be devastated by things that change in this life. And when He says, “I got this.” You know He really really really does.

This morning the Brandenburg Concerto came on the classical station I listen to on the way to work. I remembered a time when my Mom and I were much younger and I used to listen to this in my old room when the leaves rained yellow in the fall. She used to tell me it made her nervous, and she called it the “nervous music.” It was a sweet memory and I was smiling yet I wanted to cry too.

It comforted me to know that God and the Brandenburg concerto will never change, even if everything else does. And wouldn’t you know that God worked it out that the last note played as I coasted to a stop in the parking lot.

The best way we can honor today is by being fully present in the moment God gives us and by cherishing the people in our lives right now, we shape our memories tomorrow. We can tell time who’s boss because we don’t have to regret it when it’s gone.

See Me

A letter to our youth obsessed culture:

See me not as a “Senior” but as a person.

Don’t cast me aside as if I no longer have any value. Don’t look at me as having passed my expiration date. People don’t have those. There is life, and there is death, and while I have breath, I still have life. I still have opinions. I stll have feelings.

If you are a health care worker and you are looking after me? When I tell you I have to use the bathroom, don’t tell me when you can get to it. Can you imagine just for a moment how you would feel if you had to ask another person to help you do that? One of our most basic of human functions? Think of me the next time you are rushing to the bathroom when you think you can’t hold it anymore. I have been through a lot in my life, and I don’t deserve that.

Don’t see just my wrinkled skin, watery eyes, see the value of all my years added up.

There is much I can still teach you. Much you still have to learn.

I know it makes you uncomfortable to see me because I am a reminder that you too will be here someday. You will see the rights you once had slowly dwindling away and your friends and loved ones die one by one. You will remember your youth and how you felt, who you loved and how they loved you.

You will remember smooth glowing skin and strong legs that never got tired.

See me. See me with your heart and you will see the value of my soul which is priceless to God.

See that all of us equal here.

Because I have laced my days together with Gratitude, with a big “G” I can be at peace even here. I may look alone to you, but I’m not. I have the best company you can imagine because He dwells with me. Here.

Here in my sunny chair, in my little room, I take comfort in the God who saw me in my Mother’s womb. He sees me the way I was then, a newly born soul.

Soon, very soon I will be born once more and this time forever.

See me.

For you created my inmost being;
    you knit me together in my mother’s womb.
I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
    your works are wonderful,
    I know that full well.
My frame was not hidden from you
    when I was made in the secret place,
    when I was woven together in the depths of the earth.
Your eyes saw my unformed body;
    all the days ordained for me were written in your book
    before one of them came to be.
How precious to me are your thoughts,^[a] God!
    How vast is the sum of them!
Were I to count them,
    they would outnumber the grains of sand—
    when I awake, I am still with you.

Psalm 139:13-18

photo: flickr by Nutch Bicer, some rights reserved

It’s God who gave the nod

I was going to say something about how time is washed away like the water washes the sand back out to sea but that was just too Hallmark. Nothing against Hallmark mind you, I love the movies, the stores and the cards. However, now that I have planted that seed, I will let the picture do a much better job than my words could anyway.

What can I say? It’s my Birthday and I liked the picture.

My day dawned happy. I already had Facebook posts and cards at 4:30 AM and a best friend who got up bleary eyed just to wish me a happy day and give me a Birthday hug. How cool is that? The cats just wanted food, but I gave them hugs too and asked if they had their party hats ready for tonight. I think they rolled their eyes.

And even though the freeway detour put me late to work. I sensed the Lord smiling on me as the sky sped past above my moonroof. It looked like Rafael was painting from Heaven.

On that detour I saw things I wouldn’t have ordinarily seen; a man walking his dog, stumbling in the dark. I saw country houses still asleep and I was grateful for the detour signs which were clear. I am one of those directionally challenged people for whom everything presents itself in a dramatically different way in the dark.

My heart was fairly bursting with the joy of the Lord and this was my overwhelming thought:

That it wasn’t just my parents who brought me here to this place, it was God who gave the nod. It’s God who packaged my particular brand of DNA and yours too. I am here because He wanted me.

How can I not feel overwhelming gratitude?

This past year has had a fair amount of sadness and stress, like every year, but the joys have far outweighed it. People in our life have met eternity, and some have moved and found new homes. Old things were sold to make way for new lives, new starts. New hopes and dreams.

I was able to help my best friend through some very difficult moments and celebrate victories and sit on the beach once again and eat seafood until we couldn’t hold anymore. And in the backdrop of most every moment we were able to laugh.

There were several hospital trips and I was there to feed my brother ice-chips and rub his feet on two occasions, and I was there when he collapsed in the emergency room. God worked that out. I think back to when we were in our teens and I think how everything changes once you get older. You become people to each other. Friends instead of siblings.

I spent cherished time walking around the lake with my Dad and I was able sit and hold my Mom’s hand as we watched TV on the couch. I got to see Lauryn start another year of school.

I am thankful today that they are all together this weekend at home and not in hospitals.

Today, I think of the time I have spent and the time I have left. I have been given a little snippet of time here on earth and etenity stretches before me and it’s more real now than ever.

And even if I never get to see all the wonderful places I want to see on this earth, I have eternity in my back pocket. And that is something I never take for granted.

I get a little goofy about Birthdays, I admit. But that’s something about me that will never change, no matter what.

It’s because I have been given a gift, we all have. And one more year is another year of gratitude for what He’s done for me. And if I am breathing and living, I owe something to Jesus.

And when it all comes down to it, it’s people that matter. Every vacation, every emergency, everyday, it’s the memory of the time spent together that makes it all worthwhile.

So enjoy my day, my friends. Treasure it and tomorrow too.

And keep those you love close.

Never need an appointment to meet with Jesus

What do you do when you find yourself at a crossroads? You go to the cross.

It’s so tempting to try to figure everything out with our minds, but what about when you feel you can’t trust your mind? Try as we might, there are times when we can’t take it apart and put it all back together in any kind of order. And when the heart and emotions get involved we might as well throw anything rational out the window.

When the heart gets involved, thought and logic whirl around inside your head and beat the sides of your brain like a tennis shoe in a spin dryer until nothing is clear.

When I entered prayer this past Tuesday, I took no hope of feeling better, no expectation of much of anything. It was simply all I knew how to do. There are times you enter prayer that way.

I got a call from Mom on Monday evening. My Dad was on his way to the ER for irregular heartbeat. My Mom sounded okay, but I could hear the panic undertow in her voice. She said he hadn’t felt good for a couple of days. They ran some tests and released him, and he was back in his own bed by 2:30 Tuesday morning.

I thought of that old Lewis Grizzard line: “Elvis is dead and I don’t feel so good myself.” Now, my Mom, my Dad and my brother are all on medication for heart issues. And I don’t feel so good myself. Actually, I feel fine, but the stress of all this might kill me.

I want to swoop down and fix it all for them. I want to go take over and do what they can’t.

When it’s hard for me to open a jar, I feel bad because if it is hard for me, how much harder for my Mom? It’s little things like that I think of. I toss and turn in the night and wonder when the next call will come. First, Dad’s eyes and now his heart. I realize I am going through a kind of grief. A grief of knowing someday they really won’t be here.

So Tuesday morning I really needed my prayer time. I even lit three candles instead of one. I needed Father Son and Holy Ghost all hands on deck prayer.

And kneeling there by my chair in the silence, I felt the weight of importance in each and every moment we have here on earth. This life is but a breath, a vapor. A little while and then we are gone……

Eternity stretches before us like a shimmering cord that reaches to Heaven and it’s tethered to the cross. I know if I cling to Jesus, somehow I can always find my way back home. I just have to trust Him with this little speck of time that is my life.

No matter what the heartache. No matter how bleak the future might have looked 30 minutes ago, I now find that a few moments at the foot of a blood soaked cross, a light switch has been thrown. All of a sudden, just for this moment my future is as bright as the noonday sun. And that one moment is enough.

And oh what relief it is to find at times when the soul has been swept bare and black as night that Jesus has not left, that He’s there holding out a candle to light my way.

I long for the times before vandals, when the churches were open and the light was always on and the pastor or priest was always “In.” I long for the little country parish when the minister made house calls and offered a cup of tea. When you could just show up without an appointment.

I may not have Father Tim, but I have Jesus.

And He is always “In”

Carehomes: Not for wimps

Those who spend any time at all in Care homes come away with a new appreciation for the people who live there and the people who work there. Since Elaine’s Mom was moved into an assisted living facility I accompany her there quite often. I have said in the past that Care homes are the great equalizer. Assisted living care homes are kind of like a glammed up version of the other kind. The kind where people never leave their beds or their chairs.

I have come up with my own names for these places, and you might have come up with your own:

Roach Motel

Purgatory

Heaven’s Portal

Last stop before death

I don’t mean to make light of a situation that I know first hand is a very tough and in some cases very agonizing decision, but my humor gets me through a lot and I call on it often. Sometimes there is nothing else you can do.

The other day Elaine went to take her Mom’s laundry back. She went up to room 12 but her door was locked. She knocked…..no answer. She went to the neighboring facility but she wasn’t there either. With arms full of stuff, she went back and asked the staff. Then she got the key and unlocked the door. Her Mom had locked herself in. When Elaine asked her why she didn’t come to the door she shrugged. “Tired, I guess.” Was all she said.

Part of the reason may be a lady who tends to follow people around. Joyce always refers to her as a he. Her hair is very short. Martha tends to get in your face. She came up to where Elaine and her Mom were sitting in the common room and proceeded to poke Elaine in the chest where her glasses were hanging. She gets aggressive at times.

Referring to Martha, one of the aides remarked, “You know she’s gay, right?” Elaine remarked, “I don’t care what she is, I just don’t want my glasses broken.” Evidently, one day Martha cornered one of the aids in a room and asked for a kiss. The aide turned her cheek to her, but Martha grabbed her and turned her head and layed one on her full force. Even tried to give her some tongue. EEW! The aide said, “I couldn’t believe how strong she was!”

As they continued to visit, Martha kept coming back. Then she got real close to Joyce and was rubbing her shoulder. Elaine felt her Mom stiffen up. She knew what was coming.

Her Mom has always had a problem with touching of any kind. That’s a psychological study all on its own. She has always frowned on any public (or private for that matter) display of affection. “Why is he doing that?” She said to Elaine and then as she grabbed Martha’s hand in a vise grip, she said. “If you don’t stop, I will knock you across the room.”

The manager was sitting across the room and had to stifle her laughter behind the paperwork she was unsuccessfully trying to finish.

Then there is Jim. We met the first time when he backed us into his room after we remarked about his pictures. He blocked the doorway with his wheelchair and proceeded to tell us how he could still do all kinds of stuff. He proceeded to stand up as he said, “Even sex.” Needless to say, we backed out of the room as soon as we could. The staff said that Jim gets hostile as well. He also threatened the cook and called him, let’s just say the worst thing you could call a black person.

His son left him there and hasn’t been back since. From what I have seen, I have learned to withhold my judgement when I hear stories like that. There is grief and heartache all the way around a situation like that.

I heard one little old lady named Lucy say one day, “Jesus is not in here.” But I don’t totally agree with Lucy. There are saints there. People who do the jobs no one else wants to do, for very little money.

And we have met people there that we have fallen in love with. Despite where they are, they have brought the Light in with them. One of them is Ardis. Ardis used to work in theater and she has a big wave for us and a smile whenever we see her. She always looks sharp and her hair is always stylish. Ardis had a stroke and her words tumble out all scattered and out-of-order. But sometimes she says a perfect sentence, and then beams.

Sometimes you can get the gist of what she means, and sometimes it’s like playing charades. But she always laughs along with us. Lately she hasn’t felt well, and we are worried.

Then there is John. He is a sweet-heart. Both Ardis and John have family who come in all the time.

Whenever I go there, I am always a bit uneasy. I sense the Grim-Reaper in the halls. I sense the hopelessness that Satan brings wherever he goes, sometimes his foul breath curdles the air. Sometimes he needles me with fear.

He taunts me.

This is your future home……..Strangers to eat with, strangers to sit with………having to trust someone you don’t know…..this is your future.

But I know different. I remember the ones like Ardis, and Jim. How they carry their hope with them, and though their bodies are failing, their spirits are full of life, of love. They have made the decision to trust in something bigger than themselves.

When we visited Ardis, she said….”I…..ready……

And she looked toward Heaven.

She is. She knows who holds her future. And so do I.

For I know the plans I have for you,” says the LORD. “They are plans for good and not for disaster, to give you a future and a hope. Jeremiah 29:11

Calling a Truce

I tugged at my hair and frowned in the mirror. Then I remembered I couldn’t frown because that’s bad for the furrow between my eyes. I lift my eyebrows as if to iron it out. I can’t look too close at the things that are changing more with each passing year.

I apply makeup furiously and with a vendetta against the things I am trying to cover up. I do my usual squint in the mirror, my usual way of addressing mirrors ever since I was in fifth grade when my Mom let me start using pancake makeup to cover up my early acne.

In many ways, I am still the girl behind the curtain of hair on my first visit to the dermatologist office, all these years later. I look for the seat against the window, not facing it. Those visits lasted years and took me to some dark places.

I thought I could make myself disappear if I lost enough weight.

When I finally emerged at 25, by God’s grace and healing and my parent’s prayers, I entered into a foreign and wonderful place I had never been before. It was my own personal Woodstock. I waded in at first, then I plunged in with both feet. I exulted, I danced, I splashed, I reveled in my new-found joy and freedom.

I got my hair cut and looked out at a new and wonderful world. I ran my fingers over my face and down my neck where there were no more lumps. Praise God. For the first time in my life I felt beautiful.

It was a pretty good run from then on. Until lately that is.

At 50 I was all confident and unafraid, ready to take on the next phase of life. At 53 I am entering into a peculiar stage. It’s not so much fun anymore. Gravity and years are tugging at me. Simple tasks result in stupid injuries.

But from today on, I am calling a truce with myself and my body. I will forgive it for aging. I am going to fall in love all over again. With myself. Cause God said I could.

This….day….I….will….remember.

Each time I get angry at the extra pounds pressing at my clothes, I will remember this post. I will not think of it as my body betraying me, but reminding me that I have to work a little bit harder. When I look at my upper arms I won’t pinch angrily at the extra flesh, remembering how firm and muscular my arms used to be.

And when I look at the wrinkles on my skin, which to me are looking more like trenches, I will try not to dream of winning a trip to the plastic surgeon or running to get laser treatments. I will not hate my extra sun spots and think of them as defects but friendly freckles, and I will let my arms go free from sleeves and I will wear shorts and enjoy it.

I will love my legs, knowing that underneath they are the same legs as when I could point a toe and see muscles pop like a ballet dancer. I can still use them to walk fast and even run when my back doesn’t give out.

I will not dread the swimsuit season. I will not allow it to give myself permission to hate my body or berate myself for how lazy I have gotten over the winter, I will use it as extra motivation to improve and make better food choices.

I will remember my re-birth, both of them. And live the truth that God has called me wonderfully made, and good, and yes, beautiful. And when I love myself, I am not only praising what He made, I am praising Him too.

I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well. Psalm 139:14

I will from this time forward, look to my beautiful older sisters who dress young and act young. I will see their radiant faces in my mind when I am tempted to pick up the barbed chains of self-flagellation.

And last but not least I will let my inner beauty shine so bright it’s the first thing people notice about me.

And starting today, I will hug myself in the mirror instead of frowning or squinting.

Because I love the me God created.

Lori's Prayer Closet

"And when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done is secret, will reward you……"Matthew 6:6

Aging