My Lesson of the Day

Today marks the tenth day since my surgery.  It's been a good day and the woman who is staying to care for me at home, a friend's mother, has made my life much easier.  She has made me breakfast, lunch and dinner, ironed, washed clothing and made my bed.  She has smiled with me and listened to my stories.  It has been a good day and now I am unwinding realizing I have likely done enough and it's time to rest.  I did however nap for a bit this afternoon by the grace of god.  No pain pills needed.  My optimism is rising and my ability to see a future with my new body looks a little lighter than yesterday.  Perhaps tomorrow it will be even closer to my joy.  

Today I opened an email from my eldest daughter, mother of my grand kids where she shared this about me: 

Two masters degrees, professional, self-made man with financial means who raised two amazing daughters with enough patience and love to help raise two grand-babies.  A man who has taken care of himself at a very young age without a father.  You are a WARRIOR.  If you believe anything besides that, they are all LIES.  I see you and even in your weakness, you remain strong. 

To say  was moved is really a less than adequate description of my feelings.  I was moved to tears.  It is not that I think that I am so high and mighty or that it fed my ego.  It in fact humbled me and brought to mind that I am a bit of a survivor and that even if this description of me is partially true I need to look at my life a little closer with a little more compassion.  Yes, I was a fatherless boy.  Yes, I was abused by my mother.  Yes, I was bullied at times in school.  Yes, I rose above the abuse and the dark moments in my life and got an education.  Yes, I helped mold two girls who I am honored to say are my kids.  Yes, I try to be the best grandfather I can be.  All of this matters and sometimes I need to see that but it takes our children becoming adults to ask us to look in our mirror of life and see our gifts and our unfolding.  My daughters are now my friends and they are now more of equals to me than anything else.  In fact frankly they have surpassed me.  I am humbled and happy about that.  The child becomes the parent or so it is said.  I would have not known that had I not lived to be sixty.  I know it more because I am struggling with life and I am being tested every single moment.  I am being asked if  want to live and more than anything else if I would like to live in joy or in sadness.  I am being tested to the very limit of who I am and how much my body can endure.  I am being asked at every moment if I really am a survivor and if I really am the man my daughter is referring to.  And so it is my job now to allow that man to unfold allowing this surgery to be my best teacher and allowing my child to be my parent.  

As I sit here in pain, not acute but some pain, I visualize the man I am going to become as a result of this missing section of my body and this holy experience.  I wonder when the smell of surgery and other not so lovely side effects will subside.  I want it to happen fast and in a few moments I will take a pain pill to allow myself more relief hoping that god will not think me too weak after all his suffering when after all this is nothing by comparison.  Although I am polluted with the lies about how it feels to have nails driven through my own hands the truth is that I have not nor do I know that feeling.  My pain is not physical in all its glory but rather emotional, requiring me to lift my body up from my knees hovering over the toilet and still rise up feeling like I am god's child.  Not feeling sorry for Elliott but feeling compassion for him and asking him to  please be OK with that new form of normal.  

I have sobbed two times today.  It seems that I have announced this several times to my friends.  One o the reasons for my announcement is for my good.  I want my inner child to know that it is OK to cry and that breaking down like I have is going to likely heal me.  I have cried as the smell of my new life comes over me.  I have cried when I realize I won't ever be able to turn the clock back and retrieve my parts.  I have cried because the children in my life have been so compassionate with me and I have felt them to be burdened.  I have cried because my daughter Taina showed me this video of this happy song and I cried, hence she apologized to me, thinking she'd made a mistake when in reality she had served me well.  I have cried when  lovely movie about love comes on.  I have cried when I have felt alone and when I think of all the joy I have had in my life.  I have cried because like the parts of my body and my life,  I will need to let go of some people in my life for good.  My conclusion is that the tears have enlightened me, healed me an taken me to the next level of life.  I am not there yet but I will be.  Wherever that is.  



















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