| Following six months of treatment for West Nile | | | | it is. |
| neurological disease in hospital and rehab center, my | | | | But whatever else it is, loss it is not surprising. |
| husband and I returned to our community. He'd | | | | All of us lose things all our life, and often |
| recovered enough from his almost total body | | | | unexpectedly. Those losses begin when we enter the |
| paralysis to walk with a walker. And though he still | | | | world, evicted suddenly, painfully from our first home. |
| had some complications from his encephalitis, but he | | | | Months later we lose the breast or bottle, and those |
| was confident he'd be able to pick up life where we'd | | | | childhood losses continue. |
| left off, more or less. | | | | Our first classrooms herald the loss of the kind of |
| He was wrong. Very quickly it became clear to | | | | magical irresponsible freedom we'll never sample again. |
| us--Rick would not be returning to his old position as | | | | In its place enters something different: Discipline. |
| pastor in the church he had led for sixteen years. It | | | | Schedules. And our vivid imaginations fade into the |
| was no longer possible for him to endure the taxing | | | | gray tones of life's rigid realities. |
| work of caring for a congregation. | | | | If we could see the progress of all our little boats |
| We'd lost a way of life and a means of living. We | | | | through the stream of life we'd find the shores |
| knew we'd have to leave the manse--the home we'd | | | | strewn with precious things, good gifts from a Higher |
| lived in all that time, and in which we'd concluded our | | | | hand that each of us has embraced, invested, cared |
| children's childhood years. To say good-bye to the | | | | for, used, loved and lost. |
| precious neighbors we'd lived beside for nearly two | | | | Favorite people and places, pets and toys. Careers, |
| decades. | | | | jobs, finances, relationships, innocence, marriages, |
| Most cutting of all, the pirates had divorced us from | | | | spouses...trust. And so it goes. Husha, husha, they all |
| our spiritual family, the church members we'd loved | | | | fall down. |
| and led through innumerable crises of their own. The | | | | Sometimes they drop away in stages, the petals of |
| connection was severed so suddenly, it felt like we'd | | | | our life's flowers: Homes, loved ones, hobbies, health, |
| endured an amputation. | | | | abilities, and finally, independence. And sometimes |
| "Help God," I often prayed, while performing tasks | | | | they pile up quickly, like cars on the freeway. |
| and making decisions I previously (cheerfully) left to | | | | Every loss presents us with two choices. The first |
| Rick. While packing up a house and moving without a | | | | choice is to become angry and bitter, to try to |
| strong someone to whisk the boxes away once I | | | | squeeze ourselves back into the old dead skin, to try |
| packed them. During our move, he seldom joined me | | | | to grasp once again the things we've lost. |
| at the old house--the chaos was simply too much for | | | | The second choice loss presents us with is to leave |
| his recovering brain. | | | | the old behind. To let it slip through one's fingers, and |
| Losing something or someone precious, suddenly and | | | | move forward to what God may have waiting up |
| irrevocably, creates a soul tsunami. The fallout is | | | | ahead. |
| perplexing, heartbreaking, awful and terrifying. We | | | | That was the choice we made. Years later, we're still |
| should stop trying to be martyrs and call it just what | | | | making it. |