Monday, September 11, 2023
(click here to listen to or read today’s scriptures)
In school with Miles and Jasper
It is Christ in you, the hope of glory. It is he whom we proclaim.
Each time I have a symptom of heart problems, I am supposed to press a button on the front of my heart monitor, which is taped to the upper left corner of my chest, and then write down the time and the symptom. I haven’t pushed it yet.
Today I am meeting via phone with my nurse practitioner Carol, who might have expected me to push the button at least once or twice. I’m resting well, working on our new website with Stacey, writing, collecting devotions from the archives of two websites for a new book of devotions about our family, reading, and eating the good food Margaret is making for us. Read, write, listen, pray, every day.
I haven’t come close to lifting five pounds, and that restriction will be lifted tomorrow. When I’m sleepy I shut my eyes and sometimes take a nap. I can’t think of anything I’m doing wrong. This doesn’t feel like recovery from major surgery, and it isn’t supposed to. But getting a new valve installed constitutes what was always major surgery before.
I think about this puzzle often, so that’s why I write about it often. My friend Kathe in San Francisco and I talked for nearly two hours last night, for the first time in a little more than 40 years. “We’re getting to that time in our lives when we should have one more good talk,” she wrote me. “Before we leave this planet.” So we did. And in a couple of weeks we might have another one of those good talks.
Henri Nouwen has something to say about this time in our lives.
Much violence in our society is based on the illusion of immortality, which is the illusion that life is a property to be defended and not a gift to be shared. When the elderly no longer can bring us in contact with our own aging, we quickly start playing dangerous power games to uphold the illusion of being ageless and immortal. Then, not only will the wisdom of the elderly remain hidden from us, but the elderly themselves will lose their own deepest understanding of life. For who can remain a teacher when there are no students willing to learn?
On Sunday the Tomitas stopped by for an hour on their way to a kids’ event at church. Jasper wouldn’t look at me at first. We hadn’t been together since before my surgery. He stayed away from me physically too, which he rarely does. He’s a very touchy-feely kid and so am I, which suits us both just fine. Aki and Margaret taught the boys how to play Old Maid (renamed Old Boy), while I talked with Andi.
Then Jasper wanted to use a magnetic pick-up tool (this one even has a flashlight on the end) to find a nail under the couch, so we went to my bedroom to track it down among the tools. He asked me what the new candy was on the shelf above the tools. I showed him. He can have some the next time he comes over (which should be tomorrow). I guess we’re on good terms again.
Miles was also nervous when we met at the hospital. But after a few minutes, both boys relaxed. And how much are they learning under the radar just because their mom and dad make regular time for them to spend with the aging ones? Aki’s parents are the same age as we are, and the kiddos are often with them too.
Before they left, Margaret began writing Miles and Jasper’s goals for school this year on a whiteboard. Reading for Miles, numbers for Jasper.
And then there’s what they learned on Sunday afternoon – that getting older and letting go are normal parts of everyone’s life. One more thing of which they need not be afraid.
Only in God be at rest, my soul, for from him comes my hope. He is my rock and my salvation, my stronghold. In him I shall not be disturbed.
(Colossians 1, Psalm 62, John 10, Luke 6)
(posted at www.davesandel.net)
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