A BUMP IN THE ROAD


Life's little setbacks are often called "bumps in the road." Sometimes bumps happen because of  our  own poor decisions--decisions that seemed right in the moment but look disastrous when viewed through the rear view mirror. Sometimes other people cause bad things to happen, crashing into our lives and often making us feel out of control and resentful.

And then there are the bad things that you can't blame on any one person or thing. Through no fault of your own, sometimes bad things just happen. Period. End of Paragraph.

I have a wonderful friend who is my writing partner. We take turns suggesting topics and it is interesting how we each interpret the subject matter. His most recent essay focused on a friend dealing with cancer, and how he, as a friend, could best respond.

Keith, this is my rebuttal.

I have had my share of grief, and experienced many disappointments. But all in all, I have lived a charmed life. So I guess it's my turn for bumps now.

My family had begun to notice a drop in my mental acuity: repeating myself, asking questions several times, not retaining information. It was nothing that concerned me, although I had noticed that I was forgetting things more often and relied more on writing things down. Everyone forgets things occasionally, right?  Everyone walks into a room sometimes, and can't remember why.

I likewise consoled myself that we have had a lot on our plates lately:  moving to an apartment after selling our home of 18 years, burning up the interstate almost every weekend working on our cabin or to visit our daughter in Ga. We have also been dealing with aging mothers on both sides of the family. But under the direction of my GP I went to a neuropsychologist for a 5-hour memory test.

I scored well on all parts of the test except recall. Information that had been given to me a few minutes earlier was difficult to retrieve. That same information was completely gone after 30 minutes.

I could make excuses: it was freezing cold in the room, the examiner read the questions too quickly, I couldn't write anything down, the instructions were not clearly explained to me. I could tell you the test was unnecessarily difficult. But of course, all those excuses are just that--excuses--and precisely why I was there.

I am fairly young for a diagnosis of Alzheimer's, but that's what I got. Yea me. I'm ahead of the curve. But hopefully not barreling down the road so fast that I lose control.

The examiner noted that I have a high I.Q. and I guess that was supposed to make me feel better, as if understanding the reality of it all was a good thing. He told me there are things I can do to help stave off the progression. We've always been healthy eaters, and I have always exercised. We have never been heavy drinkers (until the diagnosis....if anything would make me throw a straw in a bottle of cabernet it's this, but of course, now I've practically given it up  entirely.)

The  doctor suggested I interact with people (umm, excuse me, I am an INTROVERT. People scare me.) He said I should look for ways to engage my brain, such as reading and problem-solving. I could also do memory exercises (I would give you some examples of that but I've forgotten them. Sorry. Bad joke.) 

So this ugly diagnosis is a wake-up call for me and I'm hoping for you as well. Life is short, and capricious, and if there is a takeaway, it surely must be that we should prepare ourselves for the inevitable bumps and curves life throws us, and be ready to deal with them.

I have a friend who has macular degeneration and is now completely sightless. And yet, she still skis. She has certainly been a role model for dealing with bumpy roads. She has three handsome boys, one of which she has never seen. She is a respected and sought-after Christian speaker. She has also battled cancer for years, and she has the best attitude of anyone I know. When I'm in her presence, I actually forget how many bumps in the road she has met and overcome. She does not let bumps define her. For Alex, that means fighting it by leaning hard into God's loving arms, and  trusting family and friends to help.  Alex is my driver's manual for bumps in the road.     

I urge you who are reading this to make the same commitment. We have a few choices when we encounter these inevitable obstacles on our individual roads in life: we can take the long way around and tell ourselves that the bumps won't find us, or we can meet them head-on with faith and the courage that comes from it. As for me and my car, I'll trust my the co-pilot. There's no bump that surprises Him, and no curve He can't handle.

It is absolutely mind-blowing what God will reveal to us when we have quiet hearts and open eyes to receive His miracles.

 

Friday morning was a beautiful bright day with temperatures in the high 60s at the cabin. I took a peach outside for breakfast and was eating it over the railing, dripping juice and making a mess of myself, when I noticed a hummingbird a few yards to my right at the nectar feeder. I stood very still, not wishing to frighten her, with the peach at my mouth as if I was one of those Vegas street performers you think is a statue until you poke them.

I was a peach-eating statue, chiseled in mid-bite.
 
After a few minutes the hummingbird left the feeder, and helicoptered over to check out my peach. I stood nose-to-beak with her, literally inches from this beautiful bird. Her rotating wings, beating at 50 times a second, whipped the air into an audible bumble bee buzz.
 
Well that doesn't happen every day, I thought to myself, almost incredulous. What a blessing.

Also this weekend a spotted cucumber beetle (beautiful green ladybug with black spots) hitched a ride on me at a rest stop. I didn't notice her until we were back in the car, underway. She sat motionless on my finger all the way to the cabin--more than an hour's drive. When we stopped for gas, she finally moved, letting me know that it was time to part company. I put her in a lovely lush area full of leafy greens and thanked her for trusting me. I thanked God for giving me the blessing.

I say "blessing" because I believe God was at the center of those two encounters. And if that wasn't God, then I surely do not know what is.

That led me to think about the little things. The beautiful miracles that I, so often, have failed to see. How could I apply this myopic view more broadly?

I don't mean the traditional definition of "myopic view," implying a lack of vision, but rather the larger perspective of seeing the smallness, the grain of sand. It takes faith, perseverance, dedication and love for a gardener to see the tiny green sprig poking out of a dead stick, watering it and propping it up with the hope that one day it will be a fruited brown turkey fig tree. It takes faith, perseverance, dedication and love to appreciate the silk web, realizing the energy and artistry and faith required of the spider to weave it and then to wait, for God to provide. It takes faith, perseverance, dedication and love to empathize with the snail, laboriously tracing a head-cold path as he lugs his RV on his back across a mica-flecked stone. It takes faith, perseverance, dedication and respect to understand that the great pool of water-only a drop or two to us-on the shaded leaf where something much smaller than myself, and in many ways, much larger, journeys for a drink. 
 It takes faith, perseverance, dedication and love to see the small things, and seeing the small things is no small thing. 
 
Theodor Geisel understood the macro in the micro--this definition of myopia. His Whos were a complete civilization on a snowflake. The same is true for the myriad worlds under our boot. And it is the cruelest kind of short-sightedness-and perhaps our undoing-to ignore that fact.  

There is much to cherish, and I am still learning. I will take the time to be still, and to appreciate those small miracles that I have too often overlooked. I will take the time to be still, and know that God is God, the great I AM.        
 

 

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A CABIN UPDATE

I've been vilified for not blogging more often with updates about the cabin. If the complaint came from some average Joe I would shrug it off, but THIS guy...this guy who gave me the "what-for"...for this guy I will bow to the admonishment and comply.

The cabin has ceased to be mostly a construction zone and is slowly, oh so very slowly, becoming a home. We have that toilet (oh how we creatures love our comfort) and that hot shower, and a kitchen sink with hot-and-cold. We have a mattress that sits on top of a bed frame (no box spring but hey, we're mountain men. We don't need no stinkin' box spring) and an installed, unfinished, hardwood floor on the main level. We have a metal pole in the master bedroom closet, on which I have displayed several hangers for hanging up clothes such as civilized people are known to do. I can even put my shoes on the floor and not expect ants in them in the morning.

We have a TV and a RADIO and a BOX FAN, and a PORTABLE AIR CONDITIONER and a WORKING OVEN and a STOVE TOP. If we get too much more uppity we might be in danger of being called city folk, which is quite the opposite of our intention...at least until it's time to cook, or shower, or watch Blue Bloods.

This past weekend we worked outside, the temperature being so nice: a very livable 70 degrees at the peak of the day, while back home, where our house still hasn't sold, it was 92 in the sticky shade.

Oh the pleasure of working outdoors when it's breezy and fresh and mild. Especially when you're trying to roll drippy brown stain onto fascia boards 20' above your head. It wouldn't have been so bad if I hadn't been standing on a pea gravel slope that skidded away from me each time I tried to swing that flexible extension wand up. The effort required to get the drippy brown stain roller up to the boards was the same effort that would be required to send it sailing off into the woods. Which is pretty much what happened--or threatened to happen--with each hurl.

Meanwhile the noon sun burned a hole through my retinae.

After I finished staining myself and the boards and after my vision wasn't all purply any more, PW promised me I could do an easier job: digging great big holes with the post hole digger in the dirt banks, where roots the size of intestines snaked throughout. Into these holes I was responsible for planting the chestnut trees and the magnolia. Each of these trees were in 50-gallon buckets that had to be dragged to the holes because I did not have access to a forklift. After the holes were dug 2 hours later, I switched hats and became a one-person water brigade, hoping to give all my hard work a fighting chance.

The blueberry bushes were easier to plant, since they were just 5-gallon buckets and only needed to be planted in full sun on a rock ledge that repelled the spade like some sort of magnet.

I came away with blisters, a pounding headache and some heat-induced dizziness. And where was PW, you may well ask, while I was doing all the work?

In the basement--where it was FORTY DEGREES and flat, with no pea gravel slopes, dirt banks or rock ledges--working on his movie theater wiring.

We're still married and no one killed anyone, so I suppose you could say it was a successful weekend. In addition to cabin work, we met with Father Robert who shepherds a flock of Episcopal sinners--soon to include me and PW--in our little NC town. We were present for the fledging of 3 healthy, hungry Eastern Phoebes. We watched some gorgeous deer run up an embankment as if it was flat land, just in awe of their physicality and beauty. We enjoyed the antics of chipmonks scurrying in and out of rocks looking for fallen bird seed. And we were, once again, treated to the miraculous sight of Blue Ghost fireflies and Lightning Bugs, blinking their mating calls in the inkiness of night on raw land in the mountains, where there is no light-polluting Walmart.

So my dear friend from Peace, if you're reading this--and you darn well better be--thanks for being "this guy" and giving me the nudge. It was just what I needed.

I'd like to share something with you that happened Sunday. I'm titling this one, "A Human Island in the Sea of Humanity."

We were driving home from our working weekend at the cabin. "Almost there," PW said with a weary, interstate-battled voice. As we took the exit that leads to our home, traffic on the off-ramp seemed a little heavier than normal for a Sunday afternoon. Then we realized that no one was moving forward each time the light changed.

Usually homosapiens' first impulse is to blow the horn. "What the..."?!--that ugly, knee-jerk reaction we humans put out there when we're just physically spent or frustrated and all we want is our favorite chair and the remote control. But no one blew the horn.

Quickly the scenario came into focus: police cars with blue lights blazing and more arriving, until there were at least a half dozen uniformed officers trying to talk a young man out of throwing himself off the overpass into interstate traffic below.

Each time an officer would approach, the young man recklessly threw a leg over the concrete wall. And each time, my palms perspired and I gasped and held my breath. I could not stop the tears. And I could not stop petitioning God for mercy.

What was he doing there, I wondered. And by that I really mean, HOW did he get there, to the emotional place where this seemed like his best--or only--option? Where were his friends? Where was his family? Surely someone loves this young man enough to keep him in this world? What could be SO BAD that taking his own life seemed better?

I had an overwhelming urge to run to him. And I mean I really almost got out of the car. I felt if I could just tell him some pretty little piece of rhetoric that would make it all better--something like "This too shall pass"--he might not do it. If I could just throw my arms around him and tell him he is loved, and cared for, by me--a perfect stranger--perhaps it would make him reconsider. I wanted to tell him I could not bear to see him in such pain that he would consider taking his own life. And if I can care for you without knowing anything about you except that you have come to this overpass as your best option, then how many others who DO know you would be willing to help you down from the ledge?

But I knew I could not do that. God forbid, I step out of the car and approach the young man, and he jumped. Let the police handle it, I told myself. They are trained for this.

So I prayed through my tears. Traffic continued to back up. The police continued to approach him, withdrawing again each time he threatened to jump. The officers continued to talk to the young man--a conversation which I could not hear--assumedly offering words that would convince him to step down. The police kept attempting to approach him; each time the young man would stand up on the ledge, or throw a leg over the side, or lay down on it, as if to just roll off into traffic below. Each time the officers receded, and the young man sat down. But the moment they made any move toward him, that leg was over the side again.

After some length of time another police SUV drove onto the overpass and blocked our view. I could no longer see the young man. I cried and petitioned God all the more, as if my lack of visual verification meant God was on His own. As if God needed MY help.

Several minutes passed. Traffic began to move, and my mind did the quick math: either he had been wrestled to the ground, or he had jumped. I was out of control by this time, balling my eyes out and praying very, very hard.

Almost afraid to look, I glanced in the direction I had last seen him on the ledge. He wasn't there.

He was in handcuffs in the middle of the street, surrounded by law enforcement. Somehow those professional, trained officers turned a potentially tragic situation into a glimmer of hope for the future.

Traffic resumed. Cars that had been backed up onto the interstate began to creep forward again. Everyone had been "inconvenienced" by this young man's crisis. And yet, I heard not a single horn  honk the entire time. I have no idea how other motorists had spent the time when the plans they had were upended, waiting for the police to resolve the situation without harm. For my part, I spent the time bending God's ear. Because that was all I could do. And I believe sometimes that is enough.

I have no clue what brought that young man to the overpass Sunday, or what can keep him off it in the future, but I do know God knows. God knows the plans He has for all of us--plans to prosper us and not to harm us, plans to give us hope and a future. That Sea of Humanity is fraught with things that can drag us under. But there are also islands. Swim toward them, swim toward each other, swim toward our heavenly Father, and pray hard without ceasing.

Months have somehow slipped past me. I set out to chronicle the work on our cabin, but because of the work on the cabin, I haven't had time to chronicle.

Is that irony?

If this process has taught me anything, it is that builders EARN. THEIR. SALARY. We've been up and down the highway most weekends--being our own contractors--and let me tell you, it's a good thing we're not getting paid to build our own cabin because, frankly, I'm not worth the money.

We've also been packing up the house we've called home for 18 years because we thought someone had finally bought it. Turns out, they wanted some ridiculously expensive and unnecessary improvements which we were not willing to pay for, so they backed out.

And we couldn't even keep their earnest money. What's the importance of being earnest if you can't at least make them bleed a little green?

So, needless to say, keeping this place show-ready for the last 9 months has been exhausting, mentally and physically. There were many days when we'd get advance notification of half an hour that a realtor wanted to show the house and I'd think to myself, "Oh no. I have to put those damn shams on the bed again." Because the house has to look picture-perfect. No mail on the counter (because, really, who gets mail at their home?) No dirty clothes in the hamper. No vividly-colored towels. In fact, everything that makes it a home has to be changed out and/or hidden away. Our realtor, The House Whisperer, told us it needs to say, "I can see myself living here."

And by "here," he really meant "in a magazine." My dining room table has been set with the china and sterling for the last 9 months, as if we are always ready to hose a banquet. I just dust around the plates.

Needless to say, working on the cabin has played second fiddle to selling the house. But I am happy to report that, since my last post, we have installed egg crate panels (don't ask) in the cabin ceiling. On top of that, (because it is NEVER one and done, I'm finding)  R-31 insulation. We now have a flushing toilet, with the help of a water hose at the meter. We also have a functional shower with glorious steamy hot water, courtesy of an instant on water heater.

This. Is. Huge. An indoor outhouse and a hot shower? Can I get an amen??

We have installed part of the kitchen counter and sheet rocked the bathroom and master bedroom completely. This is my first experience with sh*t rock, as I have now dubbed it, and I am happy to report that I detest everything about it. It's heavy. It's cumbersome. It's messy and awkward and a purity pain in the fanny, especially on the ceiling. And when you do get it up there and screw it down, THEN you have to tape over all the seams and mud it and tape it and mud it again. In between, you have to sand off everything you put on the first time (if you're me) and then mud and tape again. It's a process that has been very educational though. We've learned that we're hiring sheet rockers to do the basement.

The wildlife has returned since the last post as well. Over the winter we noticed the chipmonks went underground and the few birds that visited were all gray: tufted titmice, dark-eyed juncos, nuthatches, chickadees. But this past weekend our phoebe returned, with her sweet little song of promise that the cold days which encased our little cabin in cloudy mist are behind us.  Soon the fireflies will return, and the colorful birds, and the track hoe driver, who will bring a few loads of gravel for our muddy driveway and take all the fallen trees and limbs littering the property. Soon we'll have a door on the bathroom, and also on the bedroom. Soon we will begin laying oak flooring. And soon, we pray the right family will buy our beautiful home. Perhaps they will have a 5-year-old, as we did when we built it. Perhaps they will look at the spectacular view and be so smitten that they will want it in their lives every single day, just like us 18 years ago. Perhaps they will take our place among neighbors and friends, not to replace us, but to develop their own special relationships, making their own memories. I truly hope we are riding this emotional rollercoaster to arrive at the Happy Ending eventually, where we have financial freedom and our dream cabin in the mountains. I hope the folks who buy our home get their fondest desires fulfilled as well. Because this house--this HOME--has certainly been that for us.