GPS

Yesterday morning I realized it was 6/11, exactly 19 months since Paul's accident. I am not sure where we are on this 'walk to California', and like the road maps will show, there are thousands of ways to get there! We are definitely on the scenic tour and it doesn't always feel like we are on vacation!!

Every once in awhile, God will help me see the direction. When I feel like I am on a back road, in the dark, and it's raining and my car is hovering on empty, He helps me become aware of His presence. One More Time. He has his hands full with me. The next time you are wondering where He is when you call out to Him, know he is probably having to help me get back on the main highway!

At Mass yesterday morning, a woman we know asked Jon to pray for her neighbor's son who was in the hospital with a brain injury from a skateboard accident. He had a brain stem injury and it appeared there was no brain activity. He is 21 yrs old and has a younger brother who is 18 and has just graduated from high school. We could relate so heavily with this story and we prayed for this young man and his family. In the evening, Jerry dropped Paul off at my office so that we could get over to the sports store and get a stationary bike machine for Paul. Before he and I drove away, we prayed for this young man and asked God to heal him. Before I went to bed last night, I was praying again for this young man. Today, at Mass, when we can speak aloud our intentions so that others will pray with us, Mary asked us all to pray for the Lewis family, as their son Matthew had died yesterday. I could not help the tears that started to pour out. It was again, a very sad story of another young person dying and the affect it will have on their family and friends. I could not help thinking, that is 4 young people now who have died since Paul's accident. Four people we have been asked to pray for and they have not lived. I looked at Jon and he had tears in his eyes. I leaned over and said, "Why Paully? I don't feel worthy at all to have been blessed by God with such abundance." I prayed silently that I could somehow be worthy of all the love God has shown us. It was after I received the Eucharist that the words came to my mind, " Just Be My Love."

I need to go back to an instance that happened yesterday that will give those words more meaning. I had a day of worry about Paul because he woke up and was so dizzy he could not stand very well. Jerry called me at work (he thankfully had the day off and was able to stay with Paul and I could go to work) and said Paul was really off. He was sluggish and had trouble standing without support. We discussed some of the things we thought might be the problem and decided to get him to eat and drink plenty of fluids and would watch him closely. If it became an issue of vomiting or other symptoms, I would get him to Charlotte. A few hours later, Jerry said he was walking around and was doing better, but was a little shaky. I went home in the early afternoon to check on him and he was finally looking like he was recovering from whatever the problem had been. He was walking around on his own and didn't even need to wear his sunglasses. He had a good rebound and so I headed back to work. As I came to a section of the road where there is a split and you can take a lane that moves you to the next intersection or you can take the lane that feeds you back to a highway, a car moved over right in front of me and so I slowed down. I was still thinking about Paul and the next doctor appointment and was it his diet that might be the problem (yes, we still go into battle mode at times to get him to 'acquiese to our request' to eat a more healthy diet) and we really need to get his excercise routine going again and a dozen other thoughts........and then I noticed the person in front of me was stoppping. In the middle of the road, with a reason I could not comprehend since we were between 2 medians and there was no place to go but forward. I stopped and was wondering what had happened and then I realized she was putting her car in reverse! There was really no place for me to go and I didn't understand what in the world she was thinking. She kept coming at me and I started to get angry and honked to let her know I was behind her. She kept coming. I glanced back to see where I could go and there was a car coming towards us, but was a good distance back. I was very mad as I put my car into reverse because it went against my good judgement to back up on a one way ramp and being a claims adjuster, I was not in the mood to report my own claim! Our office is busy enough - we don't need any more claims! The woman wanted to back up to the point where she could get into the next lane over so she could get onto the highway. If she continued in our lane, she could still make a right turn up ahead and still stay on course. Then the 'Stubborn' button got switched on in me and I decided I was not going to jepordize myself any more and I stopped. I honked and motioned for her to continue forward and said out loud, "You can make a right turn up at the light!" Like she would know what I was saying. I was upset with her for not being more logical about this and I was not going to move. If the car that was coming hit me in the rear, at least the accident would not be my fault. The woman realized I was not moving and she started to go forward again. She was driving about 4-7 mph and I really needed to get back to work, so once I was able to get past her, I moved out left to get around her. I glanced over at her as I went by and saw the sweet and gentle face of an elderly lady who could barely see over her steering wheel and she looked frightened. Pain shot through my mind as I realized I had missed an opportunity to be the Good Samaritan. She was lost, had no idea where she was and needed help, not someone behind her saying, "You can make a right turn up at the light!" I could not stop to help her now as there were other cars behind me and I had to keep going. I looked in my rear view mirror and saw she still didn't realize she could make a right hand turn and still get to the highway entrance. I felt so bad as I drove to work. I prayed so hard that a legion of angels would carry her back home safely. I knew I had failed another sister in Christ and the meanness of my actions really stung my heart. The incidence stayed with me, hovered over my spirit, the rest of the evening. As I sat in Mass this morning, and heard about Matthew's dying yesterday, I felt like it was connected to what I had done to that woman yesterday. I am not saying I caused his death, but I was so sad that I had not tended to someone who needed my gentleness as much as Matthew had needed our prayers. As I came back from receiving the Body of Christ, I prayed and said how I was so sorry. I thought to myself how I would not be surprised if Jesus left me because there was no room in my soul for Him to stay with me. It was then that the words I wrote above, "Just BE My Love" came to my mind. I will not ever be worthy of His love, but I am called to be His love - Each and everyday. I started to feel some peace in my heart and felt with assuredness that He is leading us, that there is a reason for Paul's life and He knows why. All I have to do is watch the road as He leads me. Don't miss the travelers along the road-the ones He has left here to continue to do His will. As I was reminded this morning by another woman, God brings us home at exactly the perfect moment.

As I drove home from Mass, I remembered that all this past week I had been woken up between 3 A.M. and 4 A.M. for a number of nights in a row. I feel that if I am woken up, I am being called to pray for someone and I leave the reason up to God. Mary will take my prayers where they are needed most. At these times, I say the Diving Mercy Chaplet. But this past week, I had the thought come into my head that I should get up and kneel as I prayed. The first night, I tried to rationalize that thought right back out of my head, but it stayed. So I got up. The second and third night it wasn't so hard. I knew God must really need these prayers for Him to ask me - a very weak person who can be grumpy when she hasn't had much sleep...........smile. Maybe it was for this family who lost their 21 yr old son yesterday. It doesn't matter. God knows why. I was happy to do it and was also glad I had been able to pray these prayers for great mercy to be shown - it actually seems like I am the one who needed them most.

As I drove home from Mass, I remembered that I had a very large framed picture in the back seat of my van. My mother had purchased this picture for me for my birthday back in December and my niece who just moved to Atlanta brought it with her in her car. My mother saw it at an estate sale while she still lived in Michigan and thought of me. She knew that it could be brought to me since there is enough traveling by family between Michigan and Atlanta. It finally was delivered to me yesterday after work. My niece gave it to my sister Bev, who works with me. Bev told me she would give it to me after work. She put it in the car and it is a picture of 4 butterflies that someone drew. There are 4 butterflies, each one in it's own square. I didn't really look at it at the time because Jerry was dropping Paul off at my office, pretty much at the same time. As I sat at a red light this morning, I glanced back because the large frame caught my eye. I looked and it hit me that there were 4 butterflies in that picture and there have been 4 young people who have died since Paul's accident. I got the picture on 6/11 - the 19th month anniversary of Paul's accident. Like these butterflies, their lives weren't very long here on earth, but they brought so much beauty into the lives of those around them.

Today, please keep the families of Jessica, Francisco, Daniel and Matthew in your prayers. I know they are all still suffering much pain. While we don't know them personally, they are no different than the little elderly woman I passed on the road. While they are strangers to us, they are in need of care and I get the idea that God would like us to take care of them today.

I will also be praying for that elderly woman who was in desperate need of a GPS. Of course, we all have one - you just have to say "God Please Steer!"

You know by now I always have to confirm my thoughts with a reading I come across while praying and so it is today.

"Gentleness is so far from being the opposite of firmness that it is in fact the only true strength. It dissolves every form of opposition. The strongest man is not he who dominates passion, his or another's, with a violent effort, but he who tames it with the gentleness of reason. The will stiffens when another would bend or break it, but relaxes in the presence of gentleness. Only gentleness wins battles without fighting them, and transforms foes into friends......

We must silence the tumult of the passions, master the blind reactions of instinct, and attain to the perfection of inward gentleness, before reality will look on us open-eyed, as a friend.....
The heaven-born spirit of gentleness penetrates with light the air we breathe and spiritualizes everthing it touches. Gentleness is daughter of the light." (Louis Lavell, Christian philosopher 1951)

This reading was in today's selections. God speaks, I listen.

Peace, Love and happy travels,
Jon and Rebecca