Just this moment

I've been quiet because there are no words. Some of you have risked to be so close you can feel my heart in times like these. I treasure you.

I'm lying in my hotel bed with Dan listening to songs that make me cry in a good way. The air is thick with something you can only understand if you have been here . . . again and again. 

I was so close to happiness this weekend. I hope you know this is something completely different from joy and so rare for me. I walked on the sand with bare feet, listened to the waves and breathed an air that is pure. I held my husband's faithful hand. We ate good food. I think I had been starving myself. We drank life and made a toast to ALL this journey. The blessings and curses swirling around in our laughter and tears until we could see everyone of them as good. Do I really believe this? Yes. With all my heart. We watched the most magnificent sunset over the water last night, and I kept quoting Scripture about the heavens declaring His glory. I can't not bring Him into this. Into everything. We wandered into a little art gallery in Solomons, MD. Once again I was breathless. Oh, thank you God for the ideas and colors and soul of humans on canvas and in earthen vessels and print and pattern. I HAD been starving myself.

After all the achingly beautiful life we were given this weekend we began our drive back to Greenbelt.  Every mile seemed to make our hearts a little heavier.  Then, like so often here, the traffic stopped.  The ambulances and police came flying along side the road and then a medical helicopter overhead.  I began praying out loud for whoever was in the accident.  I could taste something so tragic just ahead.  Life on a beautiful summer Sunday afternoon and then an end.  When we finally came up on the accident I knew I was right.  

Every one of us holds just this moment.

I'm braver.  

We checked back into our hotel.  I called my sweet girls.  I held back the floodgates long enough to hear about their day and exchange our love messages.  I checked my email and facebook.  A dear one sends me these verses from Deuteronomy.  They make me think of the sunset last night.  

"There is no one like the God of Israel. He 

rides across the heavens to help you, across the skies in 

majestic splendor. The eternal God is your refuge, and 

his everlasting arms are under you."

I'm held.

Another message from a woman who has known me only a short time but in a strange way understands my heart like few ever have reminds me I am not becoming more broken but more whole in every way.  

Tomorrow, we will be at the hospital before 8 am.  After a bad IV during my scan on Friday I was told I really do need to have a PICC line for this surgery.  I will have a central line placed first and then go through preop.  My surgery is planned for 1030 am.  Dr. Henderson will cut open the back of my head and neck and literally unscrew the plate at the base of my neck and the two rods running down my vertebrae.  

Dan will update my facebook page and text the people who have asked.  Please pray for me.  Please ask others to pray Please pray for Dr. Henderson and all the staff who will be caring for me.  The details of my body and this surgery are delicate.  Please pray for my Dan.  I almost feel like I am supporting him tonight.  This is so very hard for him to be part of.  Some of his family will be coming to sit with him tomorrow and this makes me very glad.

Every one of us holds just this moment. 

My hope remains.