Monday, October 29, 2012

Echos

A blessing is a gift to others. My aunt told me the other day that I'm a blessing. I think that is the most wonderful thing to say to someone. That you are a gift.
 
A person doesn't set-out to be a blessing. There are no self-help courses outlining procedures to become one. No "Be a Blessing for Dummies" books.  
  
So, if it is true, how did it happen?
 
Why am I who I am, believe as I believe, seek out what I seek - dream what I dream?

  • The family tree is one of hardy stock.
  • My journey is littered with junctions of other people's paths.
  • From the lessons learned of those who have fallen, gotten back up and moved forward, I am the beneficiary. 
  • I am merely the outcome of a ripple.

In the most simple form of an answer, I am but an echo*.


*Because of you, J.S., I have been pondering Philippians 4:13.  Actually, the entire chapter is worth pondering. At least, that's my 2¢ worth.

Saturday, October 6, 2012

h o p e


Cold, snappy mornings. Burning piles of leaves. Gold-strewn pathways crunching under our feet. Sweaters and mittens. Fully harvested fields. Pumpkins, goblins and candy corn. 

So many reasons people love October. 

October has not always favored me. 

A few brief cases in point:

October '88 - Kansas truckstop. A stranger passing me kleenex. Banging the payphone handset against my chest. Frantic to remove her words echoing in my heart. "I'm dying sissy."

October '95 - Peeling out of the hospital parking lot to reach Sorin's bluff and catch my breath. My breasts still heaving from anger and fear as the wind bathes me in leaves ripped from the trees. My last October? Certainly the last one whole.   
  
October '02 - St. Joseph's ICU waiting room. 7 p.m. or 7 a.m.? I methodically turn the pages. Finite math systems. Spanish. Ethics. Marking time between visits to the room down the hall. Listening for his code blue. 

October '05 -  Trying to focus on my breathing by watching the late daylight shimmer on the leaves in the trees surrounding the path. A strange woman croons above my crumpled body. I hear the sirens or maybe its just my screams as something whispers "Breathe." 

October '08 - Nine hours of brutal LSAT questions. Barely registering my lower body has gone numb from the cold as I sit for hours on the stoop. Temporarily blinded by love on the path. Should I have chosen differently?

Some of my hardest trials came in October, yet, it is the month I love most.  

All because of a rock with etched letters that over the years have almost faded from sight.  I know they are there. 

But that is another story for another time.

For now, let us enjoy my 2¢ of October photos. 












        



...and photos of three people I would've enjoyed being with today, October 6, 2012. Any day, really. But today...most of all, today.


Ruth Jane Nelson Herron 04-12-1938 - December 1998; Gary Lee Oleson 09-17-1938-February 2010

Dorene C. Oleson Haydon May 1960-May 1995