Thursday, August 14, 2008

Sunrise and Sundown

All my life's a circle
Sunrise and sundown
The moon rose through the nighttime
'Til the daybreak comes around


How do you describe a day that begins with an early morning phone call of distress, followed by the stark raving reality of believing you are witnessing a close friend's demise? How do you begin to explain a day where you are swished into a quiet room at the hospital by a nurse......out of the way of code blue, to be followed by a visit with the chaplain who gently informs you that it doesn't look good? And where do you go when after staring at your spouse and seeing your own fear in their eyes as you both grapple for a breath while the unreal news that our friend is struggling for his life and we are the ones who must handle whatever the outcome.......that we must face all of this together and be strong for one another, and be clear headed for each other and for our friend's family? Where do you go?

You want to run. You want to hide. You want to plug your ears and close your eyes and click your heels and get the hell back to Kansas. Then, you go inside yourself and pull out your best faith muscles and persevere. Because you can. Because you have to. Because others need you to.

How do you describe the joy and blood melting relief only moments after surging through a copious quantity of fear, shock, electricity, anxiety.........that leaves you feeling like a weeping wet rag? How do you stop from laughing and crying at the same time while reflecting on the mountain of events that occured before 9 am after you realize that your friend is going to recover, going to make it............going to be alright?

How do you tell his daughter who you've just dropped off at a summer camp program only 1/2 an hour before when it didn't look so grim? How do you connect with his wife who is in another country at a conference? Friends too? How do you step up to the plate to make the decisions, take in the information, create a gameplan and then execute it when all around you is a slap of gut doubling reality?
How do you describe a day like that..........................when at the end of it as I write this, our friend is settled and stable after being transferred to the cardiac hospital in another city..........whose wife is now by his side, whose daughter is well informed and loved and staying with other friends while I wait for my husband to return from being by the side of his closest friend and witnessing it all........a friend who was with him just last spring when the roles were reversed??

Poignant
Traumatic

Emotional
Unreal
Heart tripping
Gut ripping
Skin rippling
Shocking
Frightening
Mysterious
Unforgettable
Life Affirming
Bloody Awful
Bloody Amazing
Bloody surreal
Tiring, so tiring
Love Affirming
Miraculously full of Grace

How about a day to count your blessings, and to appreciate the unspoken beauty of the circle of life as we live it. A day to remember to kneel down in prayer to give thanks. Yes, this has been a year of all of that over and over. We will all be toasting life, love and grace when we congregate in October for Thanksgiving.



"And as I find your here again, the thoughts run through my mind,
Our love is like a circle
Lets go around one more time."

Harry Chapin.
ps. I wrote this last night as a way to capture this day of grace and a few miracles and realized that what I had written was a moment of poignancy, which is the topic for this weeks thematic photography at Carmi's. When I had first read the topic/theme on Wednesday, I was waffling about which photo I could post to reflect the theme. I kept thinking about the many moments I don't capture with my camera during my work travels and thought perhaps what I wanted to to was to write a descriptive piece on a poignant moment I had been priviledged to experience. Then, we were put into a face to face life and death situation today.........
As I drove home with my son from his baseball game last night, knowing our friend was safe and was going to get better over time, my son Max and I took in the beauty of twilight over the Saint John river. I pulled over and took the picture at the bottom of the post with a renewed sense of gratitude.
We have to live in the moment, live like today is the last.........and for God's sake, take it all in.......... learning new dance steps as you go. chachacha.
for more thematic entries, check out Carmi's site.

12 comments:

Rainbow dreams said...

Miraculously full of Grace...indeed

am pleased all is well at the end of the day, and what a day!

The circles of life and love bring up the very biggest feelings and emotions.
Am thinking of you all, x

JP/deb said...

I love that you captured this moment with your son. What a blessing to share some time with him after such a profound, whirlwind life and death experience. xx, JP/deb

OldLady Of The Hills said...

You expressed 'the day', Beautifully! Reading this I kept thinking...Sometimes life is so very very hard and we do have to find that inner strength, pulling it up from God knws where....And the toll that can take. A toll you are not always aware of till much later.....

I'm glsd the day ended better than it began and that your friend will recover, though slowly.....
All Beautifully shared, Dana....

awareness said...

Katie. I don't think I want to go through another one of those for a while......and I'm sure our friend REALLY doesn't want to go through that again.
We'll be slogging along in recovery with them for a long while......it was too close a call and has left us all reeling.

Deb. It's been a difficult year and my son like all of us has experienced a roller coaster of life and death events. He is handling it very well.....just in the past couple of months he has watched two very important men in his life struggle with health stuff....first his Dad (which he was there for and got to ride in the ambulance because i wasn't at home when the stroke happened) and now Bill who has been in my son's life since Max was born.
Last year, along with his family, he had to deal with the death of his grandparents who died within 2 weeks of one another. Lots of questions.......big thinking worries I'm sure that arent shared yet.....

Sometimes it seems like it's too much, especially when you look at it in a clump of events.....

So, attending a regular little league ballgame last night and then taking the scenic route home really did calm the waters.....for the both of us. And, right in the middle of this magical moment, Aerosmith's Walk This Way came on the radio and we cranker 'er up and sang along!

Naomi.....thank you :)
It is amazing how "the toll" seeps out afterwards. I crashed last night very very early.....like the adrenaline finally tapped out. Of course now I'm up early, but very rested!! We have a weekend of busy.....lots of friends and family will be coming and going from here......last night, we had a serendipitous visit from a friend who was in town unaware of our mutual friend's heart attack. It was so so wonderful to see him even if it was only for a short visit. So, it will be a busy weekend, but one which will include meals and some wine and a whole lot of sharing..... I can't do much except feed everyone and make sure the bedroom are welcome respite.

ps. Our friend is doing very well. We all spoke to him last night on the phone (he's in another city right now and is only allowed family to visit) He sounded his old self!

Anonymous said...

Grace is so hard to capture, and so beautifully captured here.

You are a blessing.

Robert said...

beautiful dana all of it love how your photo and your words are in symmetry together like a lovely tapestry telling a charming story!!! I pray your friend continues recovering resonates with me as i have heart troubles so good you can take it all in and stay centered in the *now* you prove why you have the moniker you do over and over miss awareness!!!

awareness said...

Claudia...thank you. I wish grace didn't have to be preceded by such intensity at times.

Robert.... Thank you for your lovely comments and concern. Our friend is progressing well and we're hoping he will be home by the end of the week. We've had a house full of people and lots of activity all around this weekend, but it's all good sharing stuff. I just saw my friend's wife (and good friend of mine who was RIGHT HERE in the spring when we needed them) for the first time since before the heart attack. It's funny because we were both feeling a sense of being together. It's good to have such connections with our friends.

This week will be supporting the family (the parents are up from Rhode Island now) and trying to find some semblance of normalcy while we all return to work and routines.

It's all a bit surreal. And honest to God, if we could all just get on a bus and go to the beach..........we would. with any awareness or not! :)

Shaz said...

In reading this my dear friend I am reminded so blatently of the morning just a few months ago of Bens near fatal stabbing and reminded of the torment when all you have to rely on is FAITH.
Beautifully written Blessed are we all in relief of good news. xxx

Under there... said...

Grace is strange that way, in its elusiveness...like your sunsets and sunrises, but you always seem to excel in giving us a glimpse of its fleeting beauty in the real world we live in. Bravo!!

BreadBox said...

I was very relieved to get to the end of your post and breathe. Glad it is all looking more stable again.

N.

Karen said...

My heart was truly in my mouth all the way through that Dana and it was such a relief to read that your friend will be ok after a period of recovery. It really is a reality check that though extremely stressful at the time, certainly does make us reassess the things that are important in our lives.

You are all in my thoughts.

awareness said...

Layla.....thanks. I still have that half written post on Pastor Rick and will try to get it up on my blog sometime this week. Better late than never right? I watched part of the interview on CNN....with Obama. It wasn't a bad interview.........just completely and utterly inappropriate!!

Shaz.....am so glad to see you here again. It's been a hell of a ride for you and Ben........but I do hear the tinkling of wedding bells in the near future.......if the ceremony can be any more meaningful than it already was going to be...........now it's beyond the moon meaningful. take care.

N. What a morning that was. Yes, and getting more stable everyday. We're hoping to see him sitting on his front porch very soon.

Gypsy......Despite the seriousness of the situation, we've all found our humour throughout it all. Funny how that is, eh? things can be so dark and really monstrous and yet someone can crack a joke or pull out an old story or say something absurdist and gales and wales of laughter erupt. That's what's been happening.