Second chances have a way of making you thankful for so many things. Even thankful for things you could never see a reason to be thankful for.
While I was sick with Covid this spring, I wasn’t sure if I would survive. There is a tiredness that comes with being extremely ill.. that has a lot to do with oxygen levels being so low.. and struggling for each breath.. and a lot to do with your body being exhausted in its battle. I found myself wondering if my body had enough strength to give the medicine a chance to work.
I was content with whatever decision God had for me… and very thankful that His decision was for me to finish what I started on this Earth.
With each baby step of healing came Second Chances to do things I may never have gotten a chance to do again.
Second chances to do things I love.. like stand outside … or listen to my kids talk and laugh and sing… take more photos… sing while I cleaned…
Second chances to snuggle with my family on the couch and tell them how much they mean to me.
I also got Second chances to be thankful for things I was not thankful for before. Like Dairy-Free/Gluten-free fake cream cheese in jalapeño poppers. Or Gluten-free/Dairy-free Oreos ..
I know.. I know..
WHY would I be thankful for something that sounds so tasteless?
I completely agree.. and I felt the same way…
… before…
.. but after spending a week in the hospital where we struggled to find food on their menu that I could eat?
I was so thankful for a second chance to fall in love with foods that replaced the 49 food allergies/intolerances that I have.
Over the last 6 months?
I have found so many second chances to love my crazy life within the crazies.
But the second chance that I am the most thankful for?
They say that procrastination is the arrogant assumption that God will give you another chance to do a specific task.
I have arrogantly assumed that I would have a tomorrow to do the things I love most.
“I can write later.. I can be me later..”
“Today I am too busy doing what everyone else has asked… tomorrow I will do what I had intended.”
Finishing the books I had started… now I have that second chance.
Sharing the joy I have found through my Faith and my family… now I have a second chance.
Sharing the knowledge I have found through all my research.. now I have a second chance.
Sometimes… in this busy world?
… we put off what means the most to us because we feel the things we “should” do are more important…
…but what is the point of being us.. if we never enjoy who we are..
… what is the point of having gifts… if we never use them..
I’m not saying I’m going to stop throwing a frisbee for my huge puppies… and I’m definitely not going to stop taking care of my kids…
… but I am saying that I am thankful for a second chance to carve out a chunk of the day to ALSO do things important to the core of Julie.
What about you?
If you were lying in the hospital .. concentrating on each breath?
When I was a little girl, if I wanted to talk to my dad alone.. I knew I could usually find him in his garage. His garage was well used, so it was a little dirty .. and a little oily… and usually had someone’s car parked in it.
I can still smell it. Like old motor oil combined with the damp… and the smell of the trees blowing in from the open door.
I would walk right in… and sit on the floor of my Dad’s garage.
And I was never more content.
Why was I on the floor?
Because my dad was usually under the car… fixing it… and it was easier to talk to him from down there on the floor.
And talk I did .. from what I remember. But I also remember sitting in silence while he worked.
While I sat there, my dad occasionally asked me to hand him a tool. Sometimes I guessed the tool correctly.. but occasionally he would hold the tool I handed him for a moment… and then ask me for the tool he needed again. That time he would describe it to me.
So patient.
And I’d try again.
Sometimes more than once.
For me.. that memory is what my prayer space feels like.
A garage? …you ask…
Why not the image of a church.. or a sunny meadow…? Or a flower garden?
For me?
While sitting on my dad’s floor… I felt loved, and safe… and heard.
The same way I feel when I pray.
This last year has been a difficult one for me.
So much anger in this world… so much injustice… so much sadness…
… and some of my favorite people getting sick…
I have always told people that I won’t sit and wait for a storm to pass… I’ll find a way to dance in the rain…
… but this last year…?
This year I have found myself sitting on the floor of my Father’s garage..
…talking to God while He works on the world.
I’ve found myself bringing my prayers to Him.. like a child. Bringing my disappointments and sadness …
… sometimes I just sit in silence… letting His love seep into me…
.. and occasionally God asks me to help Him..
.. sometimes I do a good job of guessing what is needed.. but sometimes I need to listen a second .. or even third time before I am success at using my gifts for what He intended.
Especially this year… it feels like it is so hard to use the gifts I have been given.
.. writing..
.. encouraging..
.. all of gifts… left in that tool box ..
But as I sit in the quiet.. on the floor with my Father?
My dad used to tell me, “What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.. but you’ll be surprised what you can live through.”
I held onto that thought when I was lying in a hospital .. 5 weeks ago… concentrating on each controlled deep breath…
Controlled… because the instinct to panic and gasp for more air was strong.. but wouldn’t help …
Deep breaths … because keeping my lungs as open as possible would be the difference between a ventilator.. or keep the oxygen “nose leash”…
I will remember that moment for a long time…
… that moment …
… not scared… but respecting the gravity of the illness that I had…
… not panicking… but focusing on each breath in its entirety… like there was nothing else in the world…
… not wanting to leave my kids without a mom yet… but knowing that it was a possibility…
… and trusting… knowing that God had my situation in His hands… in His plans …
… so I thought about that saying my dad would say … I’d be surprised what I could live through… as I felt the ability to breath on my own get smaller and smaller…
And smiled…
That moment was my covid moment.. filled with that Covid feeling … Being so weak in body.. and fading.. but so filled with faith in God’s plan.. and filled with love from my Earthly family… that I took one more deep breath … and then another…
…. and I was able to keep breathing with JUST the help of that oxygen “nose leash”….
Now.. I know you all see me joke about the oxygen “nose leash” as my son affectionately named it.. that’s because laughter is the best medicine…
oxygen “nose leash” mess…
… I won’t lie.. sometimes that “nose leash” is the source of so much frustration.. The puppies get tangled up in it… it gets caught under something … and it pulls my face back.. or at the very least makes me stop in my tracks and fix the “trap”…
… not to mention that I’m limited to 50 feet from my machine… unless I hook up a tank that I have to pull or carry…
… but I’m still so thankful for the “nose leash” .. because the alternative? A ventilator… in the hospital wasn’t as appealing…
… or worse yet .. now that I’m home… if I didn’t have the oxygen.. I wouldn’t be able to walk to the kitchen to get my own coffee … or do any simple activity without getting short of breath.
This Covid thing isn’t limited to breathing though…
It was obvious things.. like coughing up red “junk”… the swollen neck… abdominal swelling .. leg swelling… the horrible headaches… the heart pounding… the massive bloody noses.. the face swelling….
… but I learned later.. there are the “not so obvious” Covid things too… the short term memory issues… the loss of being able to sign my name… learning to walk without a walker again… keeping my blood sugar above 70 … learning how to be less active … how to ask others to do things for me…
… you’d be surprised what you can live through…
Slowly, my family is losing that Covid feeling…
… the worry that mom will go back to the hospital… my son worried to let me out of his sight… my daughter exhausted from being “the mom” to us all… everyone too exhausted to do much beyond eating and surviving…
But I never want to lose all of the Covid feeling… I hope I keep the joy in the little things…
… the love I feel when I remember the things my parents taught me…
… baby steps
… the happiness I get from little notes tucked into much needed food delivered to the hospital…
… the way my cup overflows with the generosity of friends and their front porch drop offs…
… the joy of being able to go home… even with “oxygen nose leashes”…
… being content surrounded by my little family…
… the feel of grass beneath my feet
… the accomplishment of walking to the chicken coop with a portable oxygen leash
… wearing jeans for the first time in a month…
Being able to see the baby steps of healing as blessings during the storm… means the storm didn’t win…
… so for me?
I don’t want to lose all of that Covid feeling…
.. and I will no longer be surprised what I can live through.
In my husband’s family.. that person was Grandpa Bennett.
Stories being told of Uncle Loren and Uncle Erwin… two souls that I never met… But the memories would bring out a fond chuckle from Grandpa..
… and a smile from my husband.
Some of my favorite stories were ones he told of my sweet mother-in-law.
How .. as a child… she had prayed for each chicken before he “harvested” them. He would shake his head at the memory.. and joke that they never raised chickens after that.
But more than the stories he told … I loved to see the happiness in his expression.
The joy that shone from his face…
… it took your breath away.
Grandpa
Grandpa Bennett turned 98 this last March.
98 years on this earth.
Can you imagine the changes he witnessed in this world from 1922 .. until 2020? It is no wonder he had so many stories to tell.
World Wars…
Great Depressions…
Computers..
Not all of it was good… it couldn’t have been..
… yet every story I remember him telling? He would tell with a happy chuckle.
…and every person he talked to? He greeted with a smile.
This week, Grandpa Bennett lost the fight with his weak heart… and he went to be with His Lord.
He will be missed by so many.
…by so many…
The next time our family can gather..?
He won’t be sitting at the kitchen table.. He won’t greet everyone by name as we arrive..
… but he will be there.
He will be there in our hearts. Alive in the stories he told us of his childhood… and beyond…
And he will be there alive in his children and all of his grandchildren.
Because the love that Grandpa gave freely grows in his loved ones still.
And when we listen carefully?
We can still hear that joyful laugh!
Thank you Grandpa Bennett for sharing your stories with us…
… and your joy ….
.. and thank you for raising such an amazing daughter.. so that I could have an amazing second mom.
Over the last six years, our family has chosen to bring young people from around the world into our home, into our lives .. and into our hearts.
.. and I have loved every minute of it.
I started hosting exchange students so that I could share the country that I love with the rest of the world…
… what I got?
These beautiful souls… they gave me the world.
A big beautiful world.
But ever since January?
The world has seemed a little smaller. We have been watching as the Corona virus has edged closer.. covering distances that look so far away on the map.
Edged closer to us in the USA..
… but scary for us… closer to my adopted exchange children scattered around the globe…
My current exchange student watched as it affected her country… the beautiful Thailand.
… we watched how it affected the countries on the other side of the world, while we continued to live life … trying to enjoy every moment…
As countries started to go into lockdown, we watched Italy where one of our girl’s family lives.
.. along with the UK where she was at school. Checking in when she was trying to get back home to Italy after the flights were getting cancelled.
At the same time watching Egypt… checking in with my sweet Egyptian girl when I hadn’t heard from her in a while.
.. and South Korea… Relieved that their numbers weren’t as severe, even being close to China…
.. and Turkey… talking with my girl there as she needed to leave her college and return to her hometown. To pray as she took a long bus ride with possible sick people….
… then as it got closer to our part of the world.. I added Brazil to the countries we watched…
… and Columbia… the daughter that just went home…
… And we watched Liberia where my sister was working…
… Not to mention ALL of the pieces of my heart that live in Germany, Spain, Sweden, Belgium…
We watched as this virus shut down each state in the US… one by one. As the sick count grew.. and the deaths started to rise…
…and I could go on…
I have family around the world now…
… and a love for people and places around the world…
… a love for food from around the world….
But this virus has taught me something else…
As I watched all of my daughters talk about being quarantined.. a few saying that they can’t even STEP outside. They can’t go to the store.. or work..
All of them saying they need to stay at home.
I can see so much clearer how similar we ALL are..
We all are a little worried about the virus…
…we are ALL worried about each other….
We ALL miss our family a little bit more when we can’t see each other….
…and….
Ha… and we are all very bored and can’t wait for it to be done.
In this world that I choose to live in?
It is so easy to see how we are all in this TOGETHER…
…together in love and spirit… even if we are separated by miles and oceans…
And even though my heart hurts a little bit more today… having the pieces of my heart divided all around this big beautiful world… I am so thankful for this world that I choose to live in.
Today as I pray for my family here in my house.. my family here in Michigan.. my family around the world…. I pray they stay healthy… but I also pray that they have joy and laughter in their lives while they are quarantined…
…. and a healthy dose of patience with the world… as we ALL are trying to figure out the next step…
This theatre season, my cast worked through enormous obstacles to perform Les Miserables.
And then .. on opening night?
Covid-19 starting shutting down all assembling of groups.
So 10 weeks of hard work.. and the kids were only allowed to perform for their families. The cast was heartbroken… but they wiped their tears… and performed an awe-inspiring opening night.
I could NOT have been more proud.
For me?
This experience is a little surreal…
Surreal in the sense that everything was so different from where we were 2 weeks ago. 2 weeks ago, I was reminding the kids to hang up their costumes and to clean up their own messes.. and to turn in tee shirt money.
And today… I am JUST praying that each of my cast members stays safe and healthy..
And alive…
But it is also surreal for me in the sense… that ALL of my life I have been studying Plagues and epidemics .. and pandemics. The Black Death.. the Spanish flu (that started in The US)… siege sicknesses, the viruses that wiped out the Natives, etc..
Not so much for the illnesses or the deaths… because death and suffering saddens me…
…but how those illnesses.. and the fear… and the chaos affected the people. And how those effects changed the course of history.
How poor people could suddenly own land…
…How our children still sing “Ring around the rosies”.. to ward off evil spirits…
And here we are… smack in the middle of what WILL BECOME history. Someday, kids will be studying about the Covid-19 pandemic of 2019.. and wonder how the “population coped with the terror” and the isolation..
I wonder if the history books will tell how we had a shortage of toilet paper… and no shortage of the conspiracy theories?
Or will the future history books say that the “population” learned from the history books of the past? Will the history books state how we all chose to obey isolation and quarantined ourselves at home?
Will the history books say how we banded together to give each other hope for a future?
Because we WILL have a future.
Even the worst plagues… the survivors dusted off their hats.. picked up the pieces of their lives.. and made a future for themselves.
And little by little?
We learned from them. From the survivors. We learned to wash our hands. We learned to quarantine ourselves if we have been exposed. We learned not to panic.. and not to take the virus to the next town in our panic.
We HAVE so much knowledge at our fingertips THANKS to the records and observations kept of those pandemics in history.
Because we have learned from our history? We find ourselves in quarantine BEFORE it gets too bad. We find ourselves bored and creating funny memes about isolation “cabin fever”.. while we wait for the virus to run it’s course.
But … we will ALSO find ourselves with a better future.
A future that MAY hold graduations later in the summer. A future with delayed vacations.. delayed celebrations ..
A future with strange new school routines.
A future that has changed us all in small ways…
For me? I’m praying that my future has our cast performing Les Miserables when the crisis is over.
And I’m praying that when we hear Marius sing about empty chairs and empty tables… that there are no empty chairs in our community..
I’m praying there are no empty chairs in our cast…
And I’m definitely praying that we did our part enough.. that I won’t have ANY empty chairs in my family.
But even if we never hear our cast sing a song rejoicing in “one day more”… ?
I’m happy that our nation and our schools gave them their best chance at being able to sing another day.
Life is what happens when you are busy making plans… or so it is told.
Spring time is often a busy time in our household.. and we live by plans…
We plan to do our jobs..
we plans to get our kids to their functions…
We schedule fun in… so we don’t forget to relax…
… and we try to schedule time in to visit family.
But each morning we wake up .. and we turn another page in our stories… … Some pages we get to write… and can be exciting…
…some pages are full of surprises…
… and not all of those surprises are happy ones…
While we were busy writing birthday parties into our pages.. and senior pictures … and book launches….
… life added illness to our pages…
… and sadness…
This week a beloved grandma took ill suddenly… and our family watched and waited to see if she would pull through…
… we turned each page, praying and hoping…
But with the waiting?
Her children and her grandchildren told fond memories of her… my husband recalling all the delicious foods she cooked over the years.
… and laughter…
My husband’s family is full of so much laughter…
Today.. a beautiful lady passed from this world and into the next… but she will still be alive in our memories… and she lives on the pages of our stories.
The page we are on.. today?
It’s a sad one…
…. but because Grandma lived?
….the story of our family’s life is full of pages of happiness, laughter…
Not to mention all that good food..
Thank you for every happy memory Grandma Great!! We loved every minute…
Everything sounds better with the echo of a still small voice.
Jules Nelson 