Suzee

I dug into the purse in my lap looking for the parking ticket. The downside to an oversized purse is the eternal abyss that it becomes when looking for something elusive as a small piece of paper. I knew it was in there because it dropped it the parking deck and I stepped on it nearly missing it laying there on the concrete in the shuffling of all of my bags while trying to read the signs and navigate the maze that this hospital is all while trying to rush to make the start of visiting hours. 

I leaned back in the chair in the lobby wondering what to do when you lose your parking ticket. I focused on the small group of people huddled in the corner of the lobby. They were all crying and hugging and saying things like, "I knew she'd pull through" and "She's so strong!" and "Prayer really does work!"

I dove back into that purse with renewed determination. I needed out of that lobby. Just when I was ready to give up, I spotted the ticket. I snatched it out, read the directions on the parking payment machine, retrieved the newly stamped ticket and pushed my way into the blinding sunlight.

The day was absolutely gorgeous. Clear and bright-cheerful and green. Promising. 

The antithesis of pathetic fallacy: weeping rain would have been appropriate. 

I was determined not to cry until I was in the safety of the van. I saw him walking towards me long before he saw me. He smiled into each face that passed him: deliberate kindness. His collar was starched stiff and perfectly white. His kind eyes found mine and it was all I could do not to burst into tears. I smiled and hurried faster. 

Across the sidewalk, up an elevator, down a long hall, more elevators and finally my quiet vehicle. 

I opened every window and let the cold wind whip. Where to go? I wasn't ready to be with my sweet people yet. I drove, made a U turn and headed to the only other place I could imagine being.

Don't cry yet

I wasn't ready to let it out. 

I remember the night we became friends. We waited tables together. She was bent over the ice, filling a pitcher, fighting tears. I took the pitcher from her, went to the table that had been giving her fits, poured some sticky sweet Southern charm along with the sweet tea and sent them on their way. She grabbed my hands and said, "thank you..."

We bonded over the trauma of a table full of people completely dissatisfied with the quality of their steak.

I remember the night she got engaged. I remember the day she got married. I got married. She had a son. I got pregnant. She taught me everything I know about pregnancy, childbirth, and how to care for and nurse a baby. How to cosleep. She was who I fled to when I had been dilated four centimeters for two weeks and was afraid to leave the house yet was completely stir crazy. She helped me labor with Laney. Helped me get her here. She's the one who called me to tell me that a plane had crashed into a building on a day in September 2011. We would watch"Trading Spaces" at the same time and talk to each other on the phone while I held a newborn and cried. Her husband worked as much as mine did. She understood. She made me beautiful jewelry. She listened to me. She sat with me. She helped me find work I could do with a small baby. She gave me hand me downs. She fed me, taught me, listened to me and loved me just like I always imagined a (slightly) older sister would. 

She knew me at my worst. Those long years where I had stepped away from most everything good in my life, she had loved me and cared for me. 

I held her hand today. The ventilator breathed for her. The sound was almost deafening in my ears. 

I was walking with my sister around a small lake, later, when her brother called me. 

She's terminal 

I kept looking at the sun dancing on the water, like diamonds sprinkled thickly on the surface. The beauty was in stark contrast to the words that assaulted me through the phone. 

"I think it's actually a large pond..." my sister remarked. She walked beside me. I was so thankful she was there. Comforting. 

I need to Google what in fact makes a body of water a lake or a pond.

I actually thought those words. 

I held her hand, swollen and unrecognizable, and fought back tears. I told her I was sorry. Sorry that she was friends with the person that wasn't the real me. The crazy me. The sin sick me. I told her I was sorry I hadn't been there for her. Sorry that she didn't get to spend time with the person that was rescued. Rescued from the life that could have killed me. Sorry that I escaped and didn't force her to come with me. Sorry for all that had happened to her. Sorry we had drifted apart.

I told her I was saved by Christ and that He had rescued me again. I asked her to trust me. The person that loved her. I asked her to listen to me tell her about the One who was real. The One who saved me from me. Who made me able to live this life. I told her we had to think about heaven and hell, but what I really wanted her to know was that He died in part so she could live this life. This hard, hard life. 

The nurse shyly and apologetically asked me to leave. They had graciously allowed me to overstay my visit. 

I looked back at her. I have to go...

I sat in the waiting room, not knowing what to do.

I noticed a puddle on the floor of the waiting room. The coffee had been brewed incorrectly and had overflowed into the floor. 

The hospital had a coffee disaster too. 

He was neatly dressed. Red cap, plaid shirt buttoned all the way up, black belt cinching his blue jeans that ended just above his white leather shoes. He clutched the phone to his ear.

I just needed to tell someone that my wife is in the hospital...

Was he calling a church? No, a doctor's office I decided. I heard the voice over the phone. A female. Hurried. Busy. "Do you need anything else?" I suppose she thought she was being kind. "No, I guess not," he said. He pressed a button a sat, still.

That's next. I saw my future. Suddenly my world seemed a bit easier. The noise the van was making. The dog knocking my ipad off the chair and cracking the screen. (Another score for the nonanimal lovers out there) The kids and school and the laundry and the house and the shower that is slow to drain, the emails that need answering, the friends struggling, the crushing weight of all that God asks of me and the never ending to do list...

That all got lost in view of the look on that man's face. 

These are the good days.

I saw his face go by the door. I flew to the nurse's station and stood next to him. The words tumbled out: "Hey, I'm Amy and I'm your wife Julie's friend and I go to church with you guys and I am here visiting my friend in the SICU and the coffee overflowed in the waiting room and there's a puddle on the floor and I'm afraid the man in there is going to slip and fall and I know we're in a hospital and he wouldn't have to go far if he got hurt but can I have some paper towels so I can clean it up?"

His kindness was palpable.

"I'm sorry about your friend." I could tell he really was.  He paused. "I'll clean up the coffee."

I didn't want him to have to do that but he did. I'll never forget that. 

I sat there until I talked to her mom on the phone. Her voice was so tired and so sad that I thought my heart would split open.

I made my way to the church. I held back the tears and fought the memories until I sat on the floor in front of the steps that I called an alter and I sobbed and sobbed, asking God to save her. I sat and breathed the quiet. I'm not sure I have ever been that weary. Of it all. 

Soon I was walking around a small lake, or a large pond, and her brother was saying that she was going to die. I told him my story with the gospel in it too.

I yelled at my sister, "People keep dying. If you get within 5 feet of me, I'm going to tell you my story about how Jesus saved me. I'm tired of this. I'm tired of people dying."

My husband has lost three friends lately, two to drug overdoses. A friend of mine's father is clinging to life in a hospital even now. Death seems to be winning. 

So I ran this morning. After I begged the Word to help me do this day. I felt it whispered in my soul

...He was acquainted with grief...

and that same second a raven flew just in front of me. Luke 12~ These birds were unclean and nearly worthless, yet God cared for them. How much more will He care for me? And those I love?

I'm not sure how to stop the flood of memories or how to trust Him completely in this or how to wake up tomorrow and check my phone to see if she lived through the night or how reassure those that I love that is really is going. to. be. okay. even when I'm not totally sure it is. 

I do know how to pour it all out to Him. And I am thanking Him that as I contact other friends from this era that He saved several of us. Married, parents, Christ followers. We emerged. Rescued by Him more than once. I'm praying for her mom, her brother, and especially her two children-13 and 15 years old. The younger a girl that I simply cannot stop thinking about. I hope to make my way to her very soon. I'm praying she'll let me in. I'm praying. Praying. Praying.