Sunday morning was gorgeous! I woke up feeling a little piece of healing that had occurred overnight. I told you about the anguish of feeling incapable of carrying the "load" of hosting and feeding a trillion people, but that all changed with a little visit from Mrs. Train who was taking a potato inventory. She was checking in with Mrs. Book, who together had put together the dinner menu for the 8 days. It had been decided that each family would be on their own for breakfast and lunch, but contribute together for dinners. While they had been discussing the night's meal, I felt compelled to drag out all of my ingredients. They had not asked me to bring anything to share at all, but I had anticipated sharing some of my breakfast/lunch ingredients along the way.
As I found red potatoes, garlic cloves, an onion, butternut squash, pecans, green apples, cinnamon, eggs and butter rolling around my cooler, I started to imagine putting my cast iron skillets to work for the whole crew. Mr. Train graciously created fire for me and provided an amazing, manly, knife and a cutting board from their camper. I shooed Mrs. Train away to relax with her babies and took over their space. I still didn't have a complete vision for what the finished products would be, but with a quick assessment of his own ingredients, Doc helped me set the menu.
He had some raw tortillas, some sliced peppercinis, a bowl of diced onions, a few more eggs he had rounded up, and a willingness to join me in the "kitchen". As I diced and chopped I started thinking about the joy of service and the easy yoke/light burden of the Messiah. I have been marinating in the themes surrounding the word "overflow" for weeks and the healing thoughts of "service for the love" vs. "service for the expectation, or the contract, or the validation" kept me company. By the time The Family had eaten and Doc and I were washing the dishes, I could imagine a whole new world of THIS kind of service yoke.
The Blends would be leaving in the early afternoon of Sunday, so we wanted to spend our time with them wisely. I knew very little about their love story or family challenges, but having blended a family of my own, I could imagine some of the heartaches and challenges they must be facing. It's not an easy life and humility, grace and gentleness are essential. Additionally, I've learned recently, the hard way, that desire and human will or effort makes very little difference without supernatural healing and restoration, both for the kids and the adults involved in a broken life. I was picking up those character qualities and a faithful expectation in the Lord for their future in both Mrs. and Mr. Blend and I was looking forward to spending more time with their awesome family.
After deciding the best course of action for the day was to meet at the fish hatchery at the top of the mountain, where we would segregate the men and women, Doc and Junior Blend and I piled in to ride together. Sometimes a boy just needs to escape the sisters and I was looking forward to hearing more of his stories. Junior had been hovering around the men, especially after bedtime, to listen to the men talk about scripture and obedience to the Word of God. It was exceedingly heart-warming to watch Mr. Blend gently answer his bonus son's questions and to hear the genuine interest Doc, Mr. Book, and Mr. Train took in his 10 year old life. "Heart-warming" is too light a phrase... I'm not sure how to express the pleasure I experienced, while nursing the heartache this mom feels for her own sons... THIS is how is should be. Should have been. Will never be, for mine...
We rallied in the hatchery parking lot and spent a delightfully immature amount of time getting organized. I'm positive I have not laughed so much in my forties as I did getting ready for that adventure. The guys were dumping us ladies there and then taking the vehicles to the stocked ponds we had all been at the day before. The ladies, with babies in backpacks, Moses on a leash (who was illegally in attendance according to every sign we saw) and a gaggle of beautiful teens and pre-teens crossed the highway to scope out the fish...
The hike from the hatchery to the ponds, where the men would be, was somewhere between 1 1/2 and 2 miles and the weather could not have been more perfect. Initially we thought our trail was an actual dirt road, but in short order we were on a steep, narrow path that followed the most incredible series of pools and waterfalls with more pools and waterfalls guiding us down the mountain. The mommas with babies on their backs had an especially challenging hike because of the steep trail and awkwardly balanced packs. The younger girls raced up and down, back and forth investigating a pile of empty snail shells we found and the forks in the trail. We tried pretending we were the first people that had ever seen the view, until we found a metal park bench randomly placed in the overgrown trees.
Shortly after seeing the bench, we saw a man approaching us from below. Two of the wives, quickly assessed the potential threat, quietly announcing to each other the presence of their concealed forms of weaponry. I cannot tell you the respect I have for these gorgeous, articulate, feminine, intelligent, warrior women. We were surrounded by estrogen, a collection of wildflowers, pony-tails, babies and girl-talk, yet I have never felt more like I was in the presence of warriors. As quickly as the man had appeared, he turned around and disappeared the way he had come. I had no doubt that if had he posed a real threat, these 10 girls and 1 little fluffy white boy dog would have been just fine. Now I know that there's something to this idea of Princess Warrior that I need to investigate more...
When we reached the men at the lakes the young girls were offered the fishing rods. The Blends would have to be leaving soon and the men were more than happy to give them some time practicing what they had been taught the day before.
Too soon, we hugged Mr and Mrs Blend and the five of their seven goodbye. The Train family decided to leave the lakes to start meal prep for dinner and Mrs. Book was itching to try her hand at casting. Baby Book agreed to take Moses and I for a walk to the top of the falls and Doc and Mr. Book turned their attention to Mrs. Book's personal fishing adventure.
Eventually it was time to leave the lakes and take a short hike to the cars. Moses was NOT having it. He's a perky little dog, generally, but this week was testing his limits. His paws were sore and he was tired of the sun. He chose to lay down at the end of his leash and no amount of coaxing was going to get him up. I carried him to Doc's car and the three of us enjoyed just sitting in the peace for a minute before finding our way back to camp.
Doc is a fascinating guy. With an incessantly analytical mind, he originally chose a career in mechanical engineering. After years in a problem solving environment through engineering design work, he went back to school to become a physician's assistant. He now works an orthopedic department of a hospital. Surgery, pain, and oozing wounds don't phase him. What I had come to respect most about him in those short four days is his gentle ability to be blunt and transparent at the same time. It's also not often I'm surrounded by humble men- a leading quality that every single one of the men at camp clearly possess; Doc is not an exception.
Having Doc around was encouraging. I was really thankful to not be the only single person in camp and both of us acknowledged the utmost respect we had for the other adults, who's Sukkot experience took a whole lot more physical effort than ours because of the needs of the kds. We had both tried to pitch in with an uncle/aunt role as often as possible and it was clear that Doc is already a well established necessity to all of the kids.
Knowing that Sunday was my last day and that I'd have to leave in the morning, I hung on to every opportunity to glean from, and participate in, conversations with these people. Mr. Train is incredibly wise and articulate, a very involved father- a provider and protector. Mrs. Train is gentle and attentive, the kind of person who offers what you need, before you know you need it. Mr. Book is adventurous, exceedingly intelligent and transparent with a high level of discernment. Mrs. Book is easy-going and an incredibly kind woman who laughs easily and gives generously. Doc is quiet and thoughtful, until he's speaks and then his words have strength of conviction and gentle authority. I could not imagine driving away from this family and I resisted even thinking through a solid plan for the morning.
Whatever sketched plans I should have developed for the morning would not have worked out very well anyway. I was wholly unprepared for the chest cracking incision the Great Physician still had on the schedule me for a few hours after sunrise.
As I was packing to leave and saying my good-byes in the light rain, Mrs. Book asked for me to send copies of my Nikon pictures for a project she's working on. We discussed logistics of how and where to send more than 1,600 photos since they are in the process of a move.
Doc quickly problem-solved for us. He had his laptop and an external hard-drive. We could quickly transfer them from my memory card and I'd be on my way...
Except, "quickly" wouldn't be the reality. My files were large and his hard-drive, acknowledging the day of rest, was not interested in anything faster than a digital moseying.
After an hour or two the other families busied themselves with entertaining children at the lake or taking cranky toddlers for a drive in hopes that a nap would take over.
Doc and I lightly chatted and reminisced about the weekend, while discussing what we each had waiting for us at home and work. We had been generously offered a warm and dry spot with a power outlet in the Train's camper while we passed the time. We continued discussions from the fire chat the night before and sat in comfortable silences.
Then the Healer started to slice me open. I don't believe Doc could have known he was a scalpel in the hand of God when he started to speak, but without nervousness or hesitation or any apparent awareness of what he was doing, Doc ended a moment of silence with a paragraph of analytical statements, with engineer precision, about my character, my life situation, my injuries, both deep and surface, and my already healed places.
He did not assign me an emotion, nor did he assign a solution- although he offered a few to consider. He is trained to listen between the words, to hear his patient's actual needs, way beyond their perceived needs, and he had apparently been practicing the skill silently on me all weekend. He finished his paragraph with the chest cracking question:
"What do YOU need?"
I sat stunned, feeling the impact of the assessment and his choice of words, which were both incredibly comforting and painfully exposing. A bubble of tears raised into my throat; my voice wouldn't work, so I whispered: "I don't know."
He sat quietly, patiently waiting for me to process, to feel, to react, to retreat, to engage...
"I'm so fragile right now, I have no idea what I need," I told him.
He waited without a word.
I re-listened to his assessments in the echo of my mind for what felt like months of silence. The whole time feeling and replaying the back lash of direct attacks and hurled emotions, and my responses to them, during the events of the last year, then the last five, and the last 21, and the last 41... and realized something about myself:
"No, I'm not fragile..." I paused to fix my quivering voice. "I'm really, really raw."
I desperately forced the tear bubble to a lower position in my throat and looked awkwardly my shoes, then my hands, then back at him- hating that I don't even know what I need anymore.
It was then that he chose to speak, "there is nothing fragile about you, Collene."
I realized that he had sat silently, even in his disagreement, until I reached that conclusion about myself, for myself.
This was both a familiar and foreign feeling.... No human man had ever put aside his own agenda or perspective to ask me what I need, think, feel- and then let it just be, right or wrong. This felt simultaneously like protection and freedom.
It was a familiar feeling too, although it took me a week to figure out why:
I realized that THIS is how Jesus treats me! He has been waiting silently, giving me his assessments and waiting for me to SEE, for my whole life, and I've been too busy, or too insecure, or too striving- to sit quietly and allow myself to "get understanding"- which is yet another theme phrase the Spirit is constantly whispering over my heart recently.
Doc compassionately closed the incision with gentle encouragement that he would be praying about these things; I knew he meant it. By the time surgery was over my photos had finished downloading. With a quick hug and a "see you later," Moses and I left Colorado, only four hours behind my sketched out schedule.
With nine hours of driving ahead, I was doing my best to re-enter the mindset that made the audio courses I'm taking successfully sink in to my head and heart while on the road. I was also hoping for a reprieve from the emotional intensity of the week and to be able to set the whole package of feelings aside like my smoke-filled laundry, to sort later. I was incapable of being successful in either endeavor so I sat in silence.
Anytime surgery has been performed, infection can immediately set in and damage or kill a person. The drive home was riddled with attacks from the enemy through unexpected sources via text, phone call and thought patterns.
Six hours in, Doc called to check on me. I told him about the hits I had taken in the last hours and he immediately battled the infection, first through prayer, then through perspective.
I fell asleep in my own bed around 1 a.m. Tuesday morning. I would have work in a few hours, yet I still had the draining feeling of tears that weren't going to be swallowed anytime soon. As Tuesday became Wednesday, then Thursday, I was distressed to note that I could not stop oozing pain through my eyes. A co-worker assured me that she couldn't tell I wasn't "normal", but I knew and it was becoming exceedingly draining physically and emotionally, to conceal myself to remain professional.
Doc checked in with me at least once a day through the week, reminding me that tears are healing. I imagined a surgery patient with drain tubes, reflected on their purpose, and was comforted. If I'm going to really heal, this stuff has to come out... The Great Physician's assistant spent the week continually pointing me back to scripture, back to promise that comes from obedience, and to the source of comfort- my defender, protector, provider, healer. I am forever thankful...
The Sabbath brought joy this week, and by bedtime, an end to the oozing tears. Sunday was spent in praise, with the realization that I feel a massive amount of freedom... Is it possible that THIS is the beginning of the sunrise on my morning?!
Psalm 30:1-5
I will exalt you, Lord,
for you lifted me out of the depths
and did not let my enemies gloat over me.
Lord my God, I called to you for help,
and you healed me.
You, Lord, brought me up from the realm of the dead;
you spared me from going down to the pit.
Sing the praises of the Lord, you his faithful people;
praise his holy name.
For his anger lasts only a moment,
but his favor lasts a lifetime;
weeping may stay for the night,
but rejoicing comes in the morning.
Lamentations 3:22-23
The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases;
his mercies never come to an end;
they are new every morning;
great is your faithfulness.
his mercies never come to an end;
they are new every morning;
great is your faithfulness.
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