Oxygen

For a season I kept an audio journal - one composition per day...

Janet's post and a recent email from Lynne reminded me of these soundfiles from that season, a time when I was very familiar with mixing respirator medicine, the effects of chemotherapy, morphine pumps, thrush, and oxygen tanks.

Donna's oxygen tanks rang so clearly, and were a constant presence during this season. You can hear them in each of these.

The images were from around the same time as the audio journal entries.

December 24, 2003
Breath Prayer




January 24, 2004
Oxygen





January 25, 2004
Admission

The Artist Next Door

A couple of years ago, we had an addition put on our house. Keith Murphy and co. tore off our old roof with it's cracked and weather-worn shingles, and put on a second story. A pile of nasty shingles, siding, wood and such began to gather in the backyard.

That's when our next door neighbor, a retired fellow named Bob, began to show an interest. "Whatcha gonna do with all that wood?"

My husband Dave shrugged. "Why? You want it?"

Bob nodded, and Dave said, "it's yours."

I remember Dave chuckling later on at how excited Bob was to have our discarded, useless wood. Oh well, we figured it was the old our-trash-his-treasure principle at work.

A couple of weeks ago, Bob wanted to take down a very tall, and very dead tree, which was on his side of the fence, but over-hanging our yard. Dave helped him take it down. To me, it looked like little boys at play. I mean what's more fun than cutting into a big ole' tree, then pulling it down with your Ford F250? I guess Bob thought Dave was doing him some big favor, though really it was just an opportunity for Dave to play with power tools and be super-macho. I stayed far away just in case the tree didn't land where they wanted it to!

Anyhow, today we came home from church and found the item pictured above on our front porch along with a card from Bob, thanking Dave for the help and wishing us a Merry Christmas. What do you suppose this gorgeous stool is made of? Yup, pieces of our old roof! You should see it in real life. The rounded edges, the color, the grain... amazing. A true work of art. How blessed we are with such wonderful neighbors.

I couldn't help thinking what a perfect picture the stool is of what Christmas is all about. Jesus, the savior, coming to seek and save that which was lost. There was mankind, beyond hope, desperately wicked, and headed for death. We were marred, flawed, useless. But Jesus came, picked us up, and just like Bob looking over the fence and seeing potential is some dirty old wood, Jesus look at us and said, "I can make something beautiful out of them."

I look at this stool standing by my tree and am amazed. What I'm amazed at is the artist. The wood didn't form itself into this gorgeous piece. Left to itself, it would only decay. It was the artist who saved it, transformed it, and made it into something new.

So it is with Jesus and us. So many people feel too old, too bad, too weak, too beyond redemption. But there is no person his touch cannot heal, no soul too vile to be made clean. He is the God of second chances and new life.

Thank you Jesus. And thank you Bob. I'm glad to know you!

2 Corinthians 2:17 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!

Merry Christmas to one and all.

I have posted again in Roberts Ramblings.
Merry Christmas to each of you.
Robert.

Beautiful

Today we braved the ice storm and drove grandma-speed to the late service at church. The usually packed building held a scattered crowd of maybe fifteen. Ah, but what a service. Roy's band took us through an amazing worship set (Bill, playing his pedal steel [am I getting that right, Bill?] seemed to be having way too much fun.) Roy shared a powerful testimony about what God has brought him through in the past couple of years-- heartbreak, trials...and miracles. Praise God.

Next, Eric Kielhorn spoke to us, sharing his story. As he shared about his late wife Jeanette's cancer...her life and death, and her powerful witness, I couldn't help but think of my friend Bette who died of Luekemia four years ago. I never met Jeanette, but it sounds as if she and Bette were women cut from the same royal cloth. So I decided to post this story I wrote some time back.

Beautiful Like Him

Crunching leaves announced my arrival as I made my way up Bette’s walk. Ladies’ prayer wouldn’t start for another hour, but it had become my habit to come early to set up and help get Bette ready. I tapped on the glass and entered without waiting for a response. I stopped in the kitchen and started the coffee brewing. A radio perched atop the microwave, crooning oldies.

“Good morning Bette!” I called, getting out the cream and sugar.

“Hey there,” came the faint reply, then a coughing fit.I peered around the corner. Bette sat in the recliner, eyes closed. A polka-dotted cloth wrap covered her bare scalp. She opened her eyes and looked at me through dull, tired eyes. Cracked, swollen lips hindered her attempted smile.

I winked at her. “What can I get for you sister?”

“I need that mouthwash stuff and the strawberry yogurt.” She paused to catch her breath which came is raspy wheezes. “Can you fill up my water bottle too?”

“Sure.”

The mouthwash stood on the counter, the tallest bottle in a group of many. One medicine after another had joined the crowd, most prescribed to combat the side effects of the others. The pills meant to keep Bette’s white blood cells under control brutalized the rest of her body. Deep wounds had developed on her feet. Her raw hands, peeled continually. Worse though, were the horrible sores in Bette’s mouth. These made eating and tooth-brushing agonizing chores. The doctor had prescribed a mouth-numbing wash, which dulled the pain, just long enough for her to eat a yogurt—the only food her stomach wouldn’t reject.

I returned and arranged the items on the end table. When Bette was ready, I fed her with a soft-edged baby spoon, doing my best not to let my feelings of anxiety show. Trying not to think what I would do if she started choking. She swallowed each bite, tears pooling in her eyes, then leaned her head back. Frank Sinatra sang in the kitchen and a dehumidifier hummed along in the corner.

I started putting out extra folding chairs.

Bette readjusted her feet and winced. “Did you pick up the jelly beans?”

I pointed to a grocery bag by the door. “Sure did. Buy one, get one free.”

Up until two weeks ago, Bette had insisted that her husband, Glenn, bring her to church to help teach the third and fourth graders. Now, she was too weak, but still wanted to make the Easter goody bags she had planned for the kids. She also insisted that we keep holding ladies’ prayer here in her living room.

I lit an apple-scented candle and plopped on the couch. “How are you doing?”

On most days, Bette avoided the question, asking instead about my problems (as if they could compare). Today, she decided to answer.“Janet, you know I’ve never cared much about my looks.”

I nodded. Bette was the least vain woman I knew. While the rest of us in the prayer group obsessed over fashion, Bette was contented just being herself. Her favorite sweatshirt displayed Tweetie bird, and she delighted in thrift store bargains. She kept her face make-up free, her black hair, simple and straight.

Bette shook her head. “But when I look in the mirror now, I just can’t believe how ugly I am. How can Glenn stand to look at me?”

My chest constricted with sorrow. Bette—though her soul was trapped in a dying body—was the most beautiful woman I knew. I’d never met anyone so passionate about Jesus, so unashamed to witness. Even now, she took every opportunity to share Jesus with family, neighbors, doctors and nurses.

I went and sank to my knees by her chair. “Bette, you are beautiful.”

She averted her gaze and picked at the pieces of skin that hung from her raw fingertips.

I placed my hand on Bette’s arm as she wept. Lord, how can I minister to her? Unable to find sufficient words, I grabbed my Bible and devotional book. “Why don’t I read to you?”

Bette didn’t respond.

I found the day’s scripture reading, flipped to Isaiah and read, “He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to Him, nothing in His appearance that we should desire Him. He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows, and familiar with suffering.”

The words hung in the air. God had lead us to just the right passage.

“Bette, this is about Jesus. It says He had no beauty.”

She raised her head and met my gaze.

I grinned at her and asked a question she could only answer one way. “Bette, is Jesus beautiful?”

Her eyes brightened the faintest bit as she breathed out her answer. “Oh, yes. Yes.”

“So are you sister. So are you.”

Battle Cry

The hand
drew back the covering veil;
exposing the warrior swords
clashing with the talons of dark shadows;
The Spirit's whisper floated in the air;
bringing prayers
brought by the sons and daughters of the promise;
jew and gentile
joining together to lift up the battle cry
for the deliverance of the promise.

Lynne Hasuly

Thanksgiving

Christine Benvenuti

And so...
Why on only but one, single, day?
Is there not a mere moment you could call a gift?

Perhaps two days from eight weeks ago - or-
maybe the next time the sky is up.

Or by chance, if the soles of our feet
allow our souls to meet at the corner of two boulevards.

And so...
Why on only but one, single, day?
One time only?
The fourty-seventh Thursday of this very year?

My eyes are weak from gazing...
In the direction of the "blue,"
And my soul is stirred with excitement,
As it embraces a new friend
At the intersection of "endless" avenues.