A week can bring a lot of things to pass. A week ago life looked quite a bit different than it does this morning. A week ago we were reeling from tragic news, headed off for hospital tests and hunkered down in -47 degree weather.
This morning I'm finally back at my computer, sitting in the sunshine of what promises to be a mild and beautiful day and although there's still broken hearts this morning there's also some closure and the memory of such a beautiful service and 800+ people who came to comfort and celebrate Auntie's life.
I know I feel blessed this morning. Coming off of such a wake of fear and uncertainty with my health, I am beginning to realize how richly blessed I am to have the life I have and how lucky I am to have my health for the most part.
Something about not being able to really function and take care of one's family is very demoralizing and frightening and now that I am having some days that are free of headache pain and dizziness I am feeling like anything is possible and everything is just stretched out before me waiting to be done. What a blessing that is, and one I never paid any attention to when I was taking my health for granted. Like everyone else I procrastinated and put off the chores I didn't want to do. I grumbled and complained about all the monotony and the sacrificial tasks done for my family that no one sees or appreciates.
Take away a mother's ability to do those things and suddenly they are all she wants to do. Last week I had to make some sort of snack for my daughter's kindergarten class and she wanted to use the horse-shaped cookie cutters I had put in her stocking for Christmas. A few weeks ago if you had asked me how jazzed I was to make 23 horse shaped sugar cookies on a Sunday night, I might not have had a very enthused answer. But I was determined to give this to my daughter, to let her see that life was still normal and she still had a mom who could do normal mom things because the previous week there'd really been just a whole lot of mom being unable to do pretty much anything.
As we mixed and stirred and sifted those cookies however I ended up being hit with such a dizzy spell that I had to lay down on the kitchen floor and send my little girl to go and run for her daddy so he could help finish the job. While she skipped off to do my bidding I lay on the floor and cried frustrated tears, so upset and afraid of what it meant to be a mom laying on the floor rather than rolling the rolling pin.
I am so blessed and happy to say that tentatively every day I seem to be climbing away from feeling that badly. Will it come back? I don't know? But for today I am able to wash my dishes and start my laundry and make supper for my husband.
A lot can change in a week. I have learned this before but my head is thick sometimes and it takes hard lessons to reteach this simple truth. Learning to let go and be unafraid, to take each day as it comes and to be thankful regardless of the unknowns...can I live like this? Overwhelmed simply by the fact that I am not in control but am being carried? Humbled and filled with gratitude to be able to work and serve?
Any given day of the week, I hope to say yes. Come what may.
