Category: Worry

Where You Go, I Will Go: Walking in His Path

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All the paths of the Lord are loving and faithful.
Psalm 25:10

All does not mean “all – except the paths I am walking in now”
or “nearly all” – except this especially difficult and painful path.

All must mean all.

So, your path with its unexplained sorrow or turmoil,
and mine with its sharp flints and briers –
and both our paths,
with their unexplained perplexity,
their sheer mystery –
they are His paths,
on which he will show Himself loving and faithful.
Nothing else; nothing less.
~Amy Carmichael–from You Are My Hiding Place

Sometimes we come to forks in the road where we may not be certain which path to take.

Perhaps explore the Robert Frost “less traveled” one?

Or take the one that seems less tangled and uncertain from all appearances?

Or in the recent email to U.S. federal employees, take the forced resignation or choose to wait and be fired?

Perhaps we chose a particular path which looked inviting at the time, trundling along minding our own business, yet we start bonking our heads on low hanging branches, or get grabbed by stickers and thorns that rip our clothes and skin, or trip over prominent roots and rocks that impede our progress and bruise our feet.

Sometimes we come to a sudden end in a path and face a steep cliff with no choice but to leap — or turn back through the mess we have just slogged through.

Navigating the road to the cross must have felt like ending up at that steep cliff. There was no turning back, no choosing or negotiating a different pathway or taking time to build a downward staircase into the rocks.

Christ’s words reflect His uncertainty and terror.
His words reflect our deepest doubts and fears–
how are we to trust we are set on the right path?

When we take that next step, no matter which way or which one, we end up in the Father’s loving and faithful arms.

He has promised this.

Nothing else; nothing less.

This year’s Lenten theme:

…where you go I will go…
Ruth 1:16

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Going Forth with the Dawn

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The heart of a woman goes forth with the dawn,
As a lone bird, soft winging, so restlessly on,
Afar o’er life’s turrets and vales does it roam
In the wake of those echoes the heart calls home.

The heart of a woman falls back with the night,
And enters some alien cage in its plight,
And tries to forget it has dreamed of the stars
While it breaks, breaks, breaks on the sheltering bars.
~Georgia Douglas Johnson “The Heart of a Woman” from The Heart of a Woman and Other Poems

Some mornings I’m not sure what else to do with my worry,
so I fling my tender heart out ahead of me, hoping
I might eventually catch up with it
to bring it back home before nightfall.

Sometimes it is a race to see
if anyone else rescues it first
or if someone even notices it out there
fluttering its way through the day,
trying to stay aloft.

Perhaps, in its lonely flight,
it will try winging its way home
and there I’ll find it patiently waiting for me
on the doorstep as I return empty-handed.

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A Kind and Familiar Path

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I slip, grabbing twigs as I fall,
assaulting an innocent hemlock—
skinning my palms, arms, legs,
landing muddy-bruised and sore,
taken down by a path I thought kind—
a familiar wooded walk hiding its ice
beneath a sheath of old, dried leaves.
~Laura Foley, “Spring Treachery” from It’s This

“Tell us please, what treatment in an emergency is administered by ear?”
….I met his gaze and I did not blink.
“Words of comfort,” I said.
~Abraham Verghese from Cutting for Stone

I was walking a kind and familiar path, part of my usual daily walk, not paying much attention when I stepped on what appeared a solid and trustworthy surface.

The danger was hidden from my eyes; I had no idea it would take me down, put me on my knees, render me helpless.

I believed I couldn’t be rendered helpless by something I trusted like the back of my hand … or the interior of my heart vessels.

But treacherous surfaces are almost anywhere we are least expecting. And so are the helpers, ready and able and willing.

When I lost my grip, I felt hands and voices lifting and supporting me, pulling me to safety, encouraging me with hope and refuge.

And so I’m here to share this, richly blessed by those coming along side me – still walking this path I love, despite its hidden and sometimes deadly, dangers.

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Talk Softly to Your Heart

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The main thing is this– 
when you get up in the morning 
you must take your heart in your two hands. 
You must do this every morning. 
Then talk softly to your heart, don’t yell. 
Say anything but be respectful. 
Say–maybe say, Heart, little heart, 
beat softly but never forget your job, the blood. 
You can whisper also, Remember, remember. 
~Grace Paley from “The Art of Growing Older” in  Just As I Thought

Approaching seventy, she learns to live,
at last. She realizes she has not
accomplished half of what she struggled for,
that she surrendered too many battles
and seldom celebrated those she won.
Approaching seventy, she learns to live
without ambition: a calm lake face, not
a train bound for success and glory. For
the first time, she relaxes her hands on the
controls, leans back to watch the coming end.
Asked, she’d tell you her life is made out of
the things she didn’t do, as much as the
things she did do. Did she sing a love song?
Approaching seventy, she learns to live
without wanting much more than the light in
the catbird window seat where, watching the
voracious fist-sized tweets, she hums along.
~Marilyn Nelson “Bird Feeder” 

I’ve been learning in retirement to let go by relaxing my grip on the controls on the runaway train of ambition. This is a change for someone driven for decades to succeed in various professional and personal roles. 

I’m aware who I am is defined both by what I haven’t gotten done and what I managed to do. And now, at seventy years old, I hope I still have some time to explore some of those things I left undone.

Except I haven’t been as robust and healthy as I wish to be. For the past month, during very chilly weather and after a prolonged bout of bronchitis, I found I couldn’t tolerate the cold air outside or in the barn while I did daily chores. My chest strangely hurt.

I finally took myself to a cardiologist who was concerned with a number of risk factors in my family and my own history and arranged testing, which I flunked yesterday.

I ended up with two stents to open blockages in my main coronary artery, plus a night in the hospital. I spent the night thinking about blessings and what needs to happen in my life now:

Reflecting with gratitude on being alive by the grace of our Lord.
Holding my heart gently and treating it well.
Humming as I go. 
Just sitting when I wish but walking when I must.
Watching out the window for the real twitters and tweeters in this crazy noisy world.
Loving up those around me.

It’s sweet to remember why I’m here. I’ve been given a new chance to enjoy every moment.

So after a lifetime of getting mostly A’s, flunking isn’t always bad.

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Breaking Through

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Walking in February
A warm day after a long freeze
On an old logging road
Below Sumas Mountain
Cut a walking stick of alder,
Looked down through clouds
On wet fields of the Nooksack—
And stepped on the ice
Of a frozen pool across the road.
It creaked
The white air under
Sprang away, long cracks
Shot out in the black,
My cleated mountain boots
Slipped on the hard slick
—like thin ice—the sudden
Feel of an old phrase made real—
Instant of frozen leaf,
Icewater, and staff in hand.
“Like walking on thin ice—”
I yelled back to a friend,
It broke and I dropped
Eight inches in
~Gary Snyder “Thin Ice” from No Nature

Everyone is treading on thin ice right now, unsure where to go next.

The trouble with overheated action and rhetoric in the middle of winter is that we all end up at risk of breaking through, no matter where we try to tread.

When we allow ourselves to be put in such peril, when we hear the creak with each step as a warning, we deserve to be doused by the chilly waters beneath our feet.

Lord, have mercy on us as we call your name in our fear and distress.
Help us recognize the cracks forming with each step we take.

Put us on our knees before you and lead us to safety.
Only you know where we need to be rather than where we are.
You’ll be there to pull us out of the mess we’re in.

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Is There a Cure?

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“Peasant women digging potatoes” Van Gogh 1885 Kröller-Müller Museum The Netherlands

“Do you know a cure for me?”
“Why yes,” he said, “I know a cure for everything. Salt water.”
“Salt water?” I asked him.
“Yes,” he said, “in one way or the other. Sweat, or tears, or the salt sea.”
~Isak Dinesen from Seven Gothic Tales

A good night sleep, or a ten minute bawl, or a pint of chocolate ice cream, or all three together, is good medicine.
~Ray Bradbury from Dandelion Wine

The woods are lovely, dark and deep,   
But I have promises to keep,   
And miles to go before I sleep,   
And miles to go before I sleep.
~Robert Frost from “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening”

If there is anything I learned in 42 years of doctoring, it’s that physicians “practice” every day in the pursuit of getting it right. As much as MDs emphasize the science of what we do through “evidence-based” decision-making, there were still days when a fair amount of educated guessing and a gut feeling was based on past experience, along with my best hunch. 

Many patients don’t arrive with classic cookbook symptoms that fit the standardized diagnostic and treatment algorithms. The nuances of their stories require interpretation, discernment, and flexibility. A surprise once in awhile made me look at a patient in a new or unexpected way and taught me something I didn’t know before. It kept me coming back with more questions, to figure out the mystery and dig a little deeper.

I also learned that though much medical treatment comes through some intervention using surgical procedures, pills or injections, those aren’t the only options in our doctor bag.

A simple good night’s sleep can do wonders for what ails a mind and body, especially when we’ve kept our promises.

At times the most appropriate cure is simple salt water in all its forms – just feeling ocean waves lapping at our feet, or sweating it out with exertion, or feeling the flow of tears down our cheeks.

How many of us allow ourselves a good cry when we feel it welling up behind our eyes?  It could be a sentimental moment–a song that brings back bittersweet memories, a movie that touches just the right chord of feeling and connection. It may be a moment of frustration and anger when nothing seems to go right. It could be the pain of physical illness or injury or emotional turmoil. 

Or just maybe there is weeping when everything is absolutely perfect and there cannot be another moment just like it, so it is tough to let it go without our tears spilling over.

And lastly, aside from the obvious curative properties of salt water, the healing found in chocolate is unquestioned by this physician. It can fix most everything that ails a person – at least for an hour or so.

It doesn’t always take an M.D. degree to determine the best medicine. It just takes a degree in common sense.

Healing tools to consider when all else fails: 
sleep, weep, keep ( promises), and reap (chocolate!)

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Preparing Their Buds

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All the complicated details
of the attiring and
the disattiring are completed!
A liquid moon
moves gently among
the long branches.
Thus having prepared their buds
against a sure winter
the wise trees
stand sleeping in the cold.
~William Carlos Williams “Winter Trees”

Winter – a quiet, still time for trees,
a time for preparation for new attire,
a time for root-stretching and branch-reaching.

Unless there are windstorms
Unless there is frozen rain
Unless there is heavy burden of snowfall

A tree might be taken unawares in the night,
branches breaking like popping gunshots,
as if innocent prey is hunted.

Remnants lie waiting on the ground,
unaware of their brokenness,
still budding, hopeful for yet another spring.

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An Empty Mailbox

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Dear Daughter,
Your father and I wish to commend you
on the wisdom of your choices
and the flawless conduct of your life

Dear Poet!
Where is the full-length manuscript
you promised us? Your check is waiting
The presses are ready
and the bookstores are clamoring for delivery

Dear Patient:
The results of your blood tests reveal
that your problem stems from
a diet dangerously low
in pizza and chocolate

Dear Mom,
You were right about everything
and I was an idiot not to listen
~Rhina Espaillat from “Undelivered Mail”

I never thought we’d end up
Living this far north, love.
Cold blue heaven over our heads,
Quarter moon like chalk on a slate.

This week it’s the art of subtraction
And further erasure that we study.
O the many blanks to ponder
Before the night overtakes us once more
On this lonely stretch of road
Unplowed since this morning;
Mittens raised against the sudden
Blinding gust of wind and snow,
But the mailbox empty. I had to stick
My bare hand all the way in
To make sure this is where we live.

The wonder of it! We retraced our steps
Homeward lit by the same fuel
As the snow glinting in the gloom
Of the early nightfall.
~ Charles Simic “Rural Delivery” from Selected Poems: 1963-1983

In snowy winter weather, our mailbox ends up in the middle of a huge drift from the blowing northeast wind. The box sits at the peak of the highest hill on our rural road, so the mail carrier can have a clear view of who is coming and going when they stop to put our mail inside.

The blowing snow also stops right here on our hill; no mail can be delivered. So, either my husband digs out the access to the mailbox or we choose to wait for the melt and thaw, and allow our mailbox to languish unopened for as long as it takes.

An empty mailbox is a lonely thing.

Junk mail isn’t the answer any more than junk food nourishes the body. These days, personal letters in the mailbox are few and far between. And even rarer are those heart-felt letters which are hand-written, lovingly stamped to be gratefully read and treasured.

When you write such letters to me, I delight as they fill my heart and my lonely mailbox – especially so on a dark, chilly winter night…

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A Poem of the Air

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Out of the bosom of the Air,
Out of the cloud-folds of her garments shaken,
Over the woodlands brown and bare,
Over the harvest-fields forsaken
Silent, and soft, and slow
Descends the snow.

Even as our cloudy fancies take
Suddenly shape in some divine expression,
Even as the troubled heart doth make
In the white countenance confession,
The troubled sky reveals
The grief it feels.

This is the poem of the air,
Slowly in silent syllables recorded;
This is the secret of despair,
Long in its cloudy bosom hoarded,
Now whispered and revealed
To wood and field.
~Henry Wadsworth Longfellow “Snow-Flakes”

Snowflakes cover all,
settling in around us,
drifting about the tucked corners
of a downy white comforter

Watching as heaven comes to earth,
plumps the pillows,
cushions the landscape,
and tries to lighten our grieving hearts.

I know dark clouds will gather ’round me
I know my way is hard and steep
But beauteous fields arise before me
Where God’s redeemed, their vigils keep
~from Wayfaring Stranger

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Whatever the Sky Might Bring

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When it snows, he stands
at the back door or wanders
around the house to each
window in turn and
watches the weather
like a lover. O farm boy,
I waited years
for you to look at me
that way. Now we’re old
enough to stop waiting
for random looks or touches
or words, so I find myself
watching you watching
the weather, and we wait
together to discover
whatever the sky might bring.
~Patricia Traxler “Weather Man”

My farm boy does still look at me that way,
wondering if today will bring
frost,
damaging hail,
a wind storm,
a blizzard,

maybe fog or mist,
or soft lazy snowflakes,
a scorcher,
or a deluge.

I reassure him as best I can,
because he knows me so well
in our many years together:

today, like most other days
will be partly cloudy with a snow shower or two
and occasional sun breaks.

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