SO>>>ROADTRIP!

Traditional Irish Blessing
May the road rise to meet you May the wind be always at your back The sun shine warm upon your face The rains fall soft upon your fields And until we meet again, May God hold you in the hollow of his hand.

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6 So nation was destroyed by nation, and city by city, for God troubled them with every adversity. 7 But you, be strong and do not let your hands be weak, for your work shall be rewarded!” 2 Chronicles 15; 6-7

SO…

After I posted the last blog entry, Pat had a slight physical recovery of sorts.  I was downstairs washing dishes, but when I went back upstairs and looked in the room she was not in the bed and her O2 hose was lying on the floor.  My first thought was “Oh my goodness she has gotten up and fallen down the stairs”, then I realized “no dummy, you just came up the stairs”.  So I walked to the bathroom and there she was, sitting there with her “3-year-old” grin.  I asked her “How did you get in here?” She answered “I walked!”  “Without your oxygen?”, I replied.  She looked up and gave me that grin again and said “I guess so.”  So I asked her, “Do you think you’re grown now?”  She said again “I guess so!”  Well what a blessing!  I however, explained to her that in the future she needed to call me before attempting to walk anywhere as I wouldn’t want her to fall and hurt herself and she said she would.  Now to those of you who know Pat and how fiercely independent she is, you know what’s coming next.  Two days later when I went to fix her something to eat, I came back to find her…yes in the bathroom without the O2 again, and then after promising she wouldn’t do it anymore…later that day…she did it again.  Although I inwardly celebrated the re-emergence of her warrior spirit, but I was terrified that she might fall and hurt herself.

On the other side of the coin however last Monday, (the 30th of January) she had one of those stroke/aphasia-like attacks similar to the one the TV reporter had on air last year where she suddenly started speaking gibberish in the middle of her report.  (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o9RCaRv-_jQ)  Since that happened Pat has not been able to carry on a normal conversation with me.  I have noticed that when she gets a phone call or when someone visits, she perks up and sounds a bit more lucid.  So I celebrate the physical victory and try to figure out how to help her with the mental challenge.  Here’s a novel approach…how about some more prayer, it has been working thus far!  God is good, all he time, and He has always been here with us and His word says He will be with us until the end of the earth. I stand on His word!

Now let me tell you about friends:

The glory of friendship is not in the outstretched hand, nor the kindly smile, nor the joy of companionship; it is in the spiritual inspiration that comes to one when he discovers that someone else believes in him and is willing to trust him.  Ralph Waldo Emerson – Glory

Last week my “bug guy” called me and said that my fish (I raise koi) were swarming when he walked to the pond.  Normally during the winter the fish are in somewhat suspended animation and don’t eat.  Paul, the bug guy, says the weather has been somewhat warm so the fish aren’t sleep.  My brother-in-law suggested I might want to take a trip to check on the house so, this past Saturday, Chevalier (or Antwine or Anthony) one of my B.F.F.’s (one of two guys who know where all my bodies are buried so to speak), picked me up about 8:30AM and off we went to Pahrump.  I haven’t seen our home in Nevada since December 16th, and I needed some papers, and figured it would be a good idea to get some things I had left there, that I need here.  This is the first time since January of 2010 that I have been away from Pat (other than the day after Thanksgiving when I had to get the car worked on, so Reggie took Pat to her Dr.’s appt.).

The ride gave us an opportunity to talk, and we did.  We talked about what was going on with Pat, what was going on with me, about what was going on with other friends and family, who had and hadn’t called (to which he was surprised when I told him who I hadn’t heard from in over a year and the family members who don’t call to check up on Pat and I).  But it’s all good.  I have much more important things to do than to worry about why certain people don’t call.  I understand that sometimes people don’t know what to say or maybe there is something in their past and that this may bring back painful memories, or maybe there is still a deep-seated resentment still lingering for some misunderstood reason.  I don’t know and I won’t until they talk to me about it, so until they do…my focus is on my assignment from God, and that is to take care of Pat.  We did some general housekeeping, checked to make sure all was well around the house, “Twan” (remember that nickname) cleaned the refrigerators and Brian and Sherri my close friends from church came by and helped us with maintenance around the pond.  They have also been a God-send and have helped in more ways than they know.  They took food to my dog at the kennel when I couldn’t get there and they have just been “GREAT!”  Thank you guys! (especially for the you know what from Alaska…can’t say it out loud, the guys in the picture below may hear me…LOL)

The Lower Pond

Now a quick story about all these names for my buddy.  I have always, for the most part, (wait that’s an oxymoron isn’t it?) called him Chevalier.  The nickname I mentioned earlier, Twan, was a name given him by our friend Clyde, (a nickname in itself) that only he called him.  We lost him three weeks to the day before we found out Pat was ill.  In fact it’s because we going to be with our friends that weekend after the funeral that we stopped by the doctor’s office on the way to see them.  Dang, we miss Clyde!  But “my man” has used his first name, his middle name and a couple of other nicknames during the 40-plus years that I have known him.  But for the first time in a long time, I had to introduce him to people for the first time (and that is in itself a redundancy, isn’t it?) I hesitated in trying to introduce him as I didn’t know which name to use.  He later said “Sorry for putting you in that position” (sic) as he has never stated a preference for which name he prefers to be introduced as.  i.e. I used to introduce my wife as “Patricia until I realized she always corrected it to Pat.  Chevalier and I have run in the same circle for so long I can’t remember the last time I have had to do an introduction.  Wow.

I didn’t find my friends; the good Lord gave them to me. Ralph Waldo Emerson – Friendship

All I can say to Mr. Emerson about that is, Yes he did and he did a GREAT JOB

This past week I have started getting calls from people we worked with before we retired.  As some of you know, it was sort of a sudden decision to retire, brought on by several factors, not the least of which was that Pat’s office was being merged with other offices and that the “powers that be” wouldn’t follow the Union protocol of giving the longest tenured persons transfers to the office closest to their home.  There were some other factors, the commute was wearing out a car every 2-3 years, not to mention what it was doing to me as I did most of the driving.  We did that commute for 12 1/2 years and for the first ten, it didn’t bother me a bit.  It seemed like on day ten years and 1 day a switch flipped and so did I.  That next two and a half years was a 30 month period like no other in my life, until now.  Anyway, It was good to hear from old friends, some of whom said we had been on their minds, and one in particular that told me she had for some reason been praying for us lately and didn’t know why…and she isn’t the only one. “Now they do” is what I said to them in response when I talked to them.  Again this is an example that God “loves Him some Pat” in that he has people praying for her and they don’t even know why.  I have been hinting about a prior miracle in our life together that happened to Pat when we first got together.  It’s something that not many people know about but I guess I’ll tell it now.  It was probably 1979 or ’80 Pat was having some breathing issues and she went to the Dr. to get it checked.  The short version is that they did x-rays and found what the Dr. determined was Sarcoidosis.  The X-ray of her lungs looked like someone had taken a paintbrush and ran their finger over the end of it flicking paint spots all over her lungs.  He explained to Pat that her condition would require him to do a biopsy (remember this is 1980) and  that it would involve some pain, and at the extreme end the possibility that he might pinch an small artery and cause her to bleed out. (she has Von Willebrand’s disease) Well Pat has never liked needles and hearing about the bleeding possibility she was like thanks, but no thanks, and away we went. Well over the next couple of months we prayed about it, I have to say her more than I, (I wasn’t as close to God then as I am now) I tried to convince her that God wasn’t going to let anything happen to her, that he would guide the Dr.’s hand and she finally relented after about 2-3 months.  Of course by this time the Dr. says he’ll need new X-rays so that he has a current picture of where everything is.  So when we got the X-ray done, the Dr. walks into the room, places the X-rays on the fluoroscope, flipped on the light and turned to us without saying a word, then nodded toward the X-ray which showed…Perfectly clear lungs!  He said ” we checked the machine and there was nothing wrong with it and I can’t explain this.  Pat asked him “so I don’t need a biopsy?” He said “no, just come back in 3 months to check it.”  Pat stood up and said “I guess I’m out of here” and off we went.  It never reappeared and we accepted this as a blessing from God.  So we have had 32 years that maybe can be considered a gift from God, but I’m still asking for one more.

I do not count myself to have apprehended; but one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead” (Philippians 3:13, NKJV)

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