Roller Coaster Ramblings

This week I’ve witnessed beautiful transformation.  A woman who was literally beaten down to nothing, she’d barely raise her head when someone spoke to her.  She rarely spoke back unless asked a direct question.  She now laughs and smiles, starts a conversation.  She looks like a different person.  It was so beautiful I cried after our hearing.

I cried after another hearing this week as well.  It was anything but beautiful.  It was hell.  A mother who loves her children passionately but cannot understand the system, cannot understand how the people around her are desperately trying to help her.  There seems to be a severe processing disorder, combined with mental illness, and possible drug use.  It’s an unholy trio making her life hell.  Thus far, we can’t reach her.

A woman who gives her life to helping others is going home to hospice care.  She’s a thousand miles away.  I can’t hold her hand.  I’ve been too afraid to call and hear her voice or to have her hear mine while it breaks.

I gave up last week.  My heart was breaking.  My house was a mess.  I called off the Advent Church or “Weird Shit Group” as my friend, Lois calls it.  I knew I should go ahead but I didn’t.  As Sunday looms and my house is in worse shape than last week and my heart has been wrung out more than imagined it could be in a week, I’m committed to hosting our Advent Church or Weird Shit Group.  It’s worse not to have it.  I need it.  I learned a lesson this past week.  I can’t give up just because it seems hard or that I don’t know what I’m doing.

We are in the darkness of Advent but the light is coming.  The hope of the world calls out to us.  She  sings sweetly that transformation is possible and joyous and wonderful.  And perhaps one day, when we face our death others will mourn that we’ve given our lives to help others, to reflect the light and joy of the Hope of the World.  That will be success.