My Offering

So, I've just been informed this week that my mother is set to be hospitalized for the next five weeks. For those of you that do not know, my mom's health is very topsy-turvy. She has a serious of challenges, namely, her skin. She has psoraisis over half of her body and it acts as a poor body armor against various bacteria. So, often than we'd all like, she is prone to infections. This hospital visit started as an inquiry into her swollen arthritic right knee. Further evaluation uncovers a growing infection in that knee which was operated on a couple days ago. Though the surgery was successful in its clearing purposes, she has to undergo blood transfusions and remain in observation. For 5 weeks!

Its not like I haven't been to this rodeo before. One year, I think it was my senior year of high scool, she was in the hospital for two months. One month at Tulane in New Orleans and another month at Lourdes in Lafayette. I believe that year she was in the hospital no less than 7 times. Earlier this year she battled a toxic septic infection that had her in the ICU for a week and half. I flew down in haste, all of us family dreading...Fortuantely, I was able to experience my mother in recovery, coherent the last two days of my trip.

Its much. In fact, sometimes I feel these health challenges are more than the share that should be given. But, then who does that make me? God? Does God really dole out everyone's share? The Devil, then? I'm exhausted of people blaming their woes on the devil, too. In fact, sometimes I think he gets more than his share of bad press when in fact we are responsible for many of our woes.

But, for the most part, my mom is not entirely responsible for her challenges after challenges when it comes to her health. Only recently have I become acquainted with accepting my responsibility when it comes to how I respond to these health challenges. This has been a very long and harrowing journey to come to these revelations. I, too, was a blamer of the Devil and mostly, a blamer of God. Only in these past two years have I started to develop a more clearer spiritual relationship with myself. This relationship alluding to higher understandings that I am (and I suspect always) will continue to uncover. And, there are some clear princples that I am becoming very acquainted with. One is that I have the choice (and perhaps this is the only choice I do have in this world) to adjust how I react to life. Another principle is that all things are impermanent. Nothing last forever. And, if I could truly swallow this- not bitterly- I may taste the exquisteness of each passing experience. And, this acceptance of passing moments leads me to the most fundamental principle I have unearthed this year- I will only have this moment. Nothing else. As my grandmother says when one worries, "Don't go borrowing trouble". I cannot borrow the future and the past does not exist. Only this moment exists.

Yeah, that's alot to take in.

I have decided to write my mom every day for the duration of her stay. She enjoys it when I write to her and its a release for me. Witnessing her in vulnerable situations where I am often incapable of doing much more to help her- I cling to the idea that in dark times, in unsure times, the action of creation can be the most healing gift offered. So, I plan to write her. My letters like little offerings to a higher realm. May little creations guide our spirits to healing.



The Serenity Prayer
(Extended version with my spiritually preferential adjustments)

God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change;
The courage to change the things that I can;
and the wisdom to know the difference.

Living one day at a time;
Enjoying one moment at a time;
Accepting hardships as the path to peace;
Taking, as [I] must, this sinful world
as it is, not as I would have it;
Trusting that [I] will make all things right
if I surrender to [a Higher] Will;
That I may be reasonably happy in this life
and supremely happy with [Understanding]
Forever in the next.
Amen.

--Reinhold Niebuhr