- Not The Only One!
- Post #145
- 23 Jul 24
- ” Virtuous One”
- Howdy ,
- Thanks for checking in again. I had a lot of options for this one as far as titles go, and I’m still not sure what the final cut will be.☺️☺️. It’s another one that preempted other ones and moved to the front of the line. I got a text from someone who has become closer to me, simply because of the the way that she has handled things and the strength that she has displayed through some pretty rough times. Yeah!, yeah!, I know that we all go through rough and challenging things. Maybe it’s just that stage of life, where we find ourselves sandwiched in between generations. I mean for some it’s a real balancing act, with people living longer, and it may not just be your parents and your kids, but many of us now have grandkids. There is such a guilt train of wanting to take care of those , who have given us everything . Life itself is because of your parents. Perhaps , not for all of us, but as we have gotten older, you realize some of the sacrifices that your parents made on your behalf when you were growing up.
- It’s real easy sometimes to just take your parents for granted as you play the part of a leach, and it’s just give, give, and I want or I need.☺️ Sometimes we are just simply unaware of the choices that they made on our behalf to make our lives better. I said it’s a guilt train and it is. You look at your grandkids and so desperately wanting to spend more time with them before they get to a point , where you just aren’t cool anymore and just a straight up old person that they try to watch their language when you are around ☺️☺️. Seriously they grow like weeds, and every time you are on Facebook or Instagram, it’s another birthday or them moving up from tee ball to coaches pitch, or something else that reminds you that time is slipping away.
- My reality check comes from my phone and the brilliance of facial recognition. It puts these collages together and I can see my oldest grandson go from two years old to almost seventeen in mere seconds. Something that is supposed to be a good thing is just , cruelty to old people ☺️☺️. There is nothing to let you know that time is getting away more than him getting his driving license and going to his first formal dance. What makes it even more pitiful is that there are days when I have to stop and think real hard about when those things took place for me. ☺️☺️.
- There are seasons of life and each season brings new challenges and adventures. I never thought about getting up off of the floor as being an adventure, but it is, and not really a good one☺️☺️. Things that we use to just take for granted….no longer. The last few years has introduced me to the phase of life where loosing people has become more frequent. I have to say….not really a fan. ☺️☺️.
- Many post ago, I addressed that I’m not really a funeral guy. Some people show up if they vaguely knew someone, I’m not that guy. ☺️☺️In fact , kind of always been proud of the fact that I had a low number when it comes to funeral attendance. People had to hold a special place for me to visit them in their horizontal state. However now you find that your aunts and uncles who use to play with you when you were little or gave you some dating advice, or even let you borrow their car back in the day, are just checking out , left and right. The people that You grew up with and their parents saw you as an extension of the family or yelled at you to keep you out of trouble, leaving as well. So, people are loosing parents and I even had a lady that I use to work with loose her husband in his sleep and he wasn’t in bad shape, mid fifties, just gone.🥲🥲. Death is real and it seems to be more frequent. I started this off talking about someone who has become a friend and the funny thing is that we have never met face to face. We have never FaceTime or any kind of video chat, and our phone conversations have been few in number. I think that some where down the road I might want to correct that misjustice and have a have to face with her and to throw my arms around her for a hug, for all that she has stood for.
- This friend and her text, brought a very ugly truth to life for me and that is that sometimes parents bury their children. The old adage is, is it better to never know love , or to have love then to loose it. ?I mean on the surface they are both awful choices. It’s a horrible game of would you rather. ☺️
- We say sometimes the lesser of two evils, but often they are just two bad things that You Don’t want to have to choose between…..at all . Who wants to walk through nine months of pregnancy and do all of the getting ready stuff, the shopping, the reading , doctor visits, preparing a nursery , baby showers , to say nothing about the havoc wreaked on your body. The weight gain, cravings, never ending pee breaks, and to have a little alien trying to rearrange your internal organs ☺️☺️. All of this and for the child to be still born or to only live for a few hours, days or weeks. How absolutely horrible 😞, but it happens every day, to someone, somewhere. They say that women are the weaker sex, but we know better, because there would not be multiple miscarriages to my story, I would just quit trying, because it would just be to stinking hard and I’m not that strong. We often live in this place between what we imagine and what actually is. The one’s who loose a child shortly after birth are just left with all of the what ifs. You think about silly things like would they have been left handed or right handed or maybe both. You wonder if their hair would change colors out in the sun. Would they have said mama or Dada first. The dreams of teaching them to ride a bike, just vanish into thin air
- . The rest of the story is as equally painful if not more so, because this is the actual. You find yourself standing over a box and all you can think about is, this is wrong . I’m not supposed to be burying my kid, and oh how to God you wish with all of your heart that it was the other way around . You truly wish that it was them standing over you, and you wouldn’t know the god awful pain that just radiates in your gut , day after day and has become your unwelcomed constant companion. .You have all of the memories from over the years. The visits by the tooth fairy, the scent knees and all of the boo boos . You got that chance to teach them to ride the bike, you remember all of the trophies and awards, the ugly stickmen drawings that you swore were just masterpieces ☺️☺️. You remember sitting up the nights after they started driving and they were late getting home . It was only ten minutes or so, but felt like an eternity as you paced the floor and your mind ran to every worse case scenario. You also remember the tears of not making the team, or No one asking them to the dance, or some boy tell her that she wasn’t pretty enough because of the braces. You stand over that box and you are just absolutely flooded with memories, emotions and sorrows. Maybe you remember being at the hospital or in the delivery room when they had their first child, and now, they stare at you with blank looks on their faces, from across the box as they wonder where they go now without their mom or dad . Two hellacious story lines both loaded with pain and sorrow.
- This new friend whom I’ve only seen in pictures, texted me to let me know that they had a memorial service for her sister Amy, who became my dear friend who past away four days before Christmas. Some how that’s just another kick to the jewels, because something that is supposed to be joyous and inspiring….Christmas, will also now be the thing that reminds us of Amy’s trip home. They say that it’s easier when you know of their eternal destination, but that’s not true every single day that You get up and know that You can’t pick up the phone and hear them smile or hear them laugh. I have no doubt that she is in heaven , and in a much better place. I don’t think that most of us can even begin to think about a place without pain and suffering. A place with no tears or heart aches. From the time we are born, that is all we know, the struggles of life, it starts with a diaper rash and its on from that point on☺️☺️. I remember her last days , weeks and months, I didn’t recognize them for that then, but now looking back. She was truly an amazing person. I knew that her body was just riddled with pain as she waited for a kidney and her body began to turn against her , but she was always concerned about others, such as her mom. She always felt as if she should be helping out with her parents because they were getting older, but she was sad that she just didn’t have it within herself and she didn’t want to be a burden, not just to them, but to anyone. She was fiercely independent all the way up until the end. She reminded me of my baby sister who took a similar journey eight years prior. Kris, that’s her name to take the mystery out of it, she wanted me to know that her mom was having a really hard time after the memorial service and thought that maybe I might want to reach out. I know how hard it can be, as I said earlier, death is becoming more frequent. Funerals and memorial service are really for those of us who are left behind. We celebrate their lives, the people we remember them to be and the lives that they lived.
- I always found the word Eulogy to be an oxymoron, because it means to edify or to speak well of, but the time to do that is when we have them with us. It doesn’t matter where you fall in the rotation, whether a parent, grandparent , grandchild, or a really good friend, it just doesn’t matter, every day that You have someone in your life that you love….let them know that, because You never know when it may be the last time. Tell them how special they are to you and let them know the value that they add to your life, before it’s to late and you find yourself standing over a box.🥲🥲 At the time of her passing she had a few dear friends, who loved her immensely as some ran her to doctor appointments and things of that nature. She was never blessed with children, but had nieces and nephews, but her main support was loving parents and a very faithful sister by the name of Kris, who lived in another state and took a sabbatical from work to help take care of her sister. Kris shared a pictures of a box containing her ashes that was buried next to her grandparents.
- I’m not real sure how I landed here with Virtuous One. In the Bible there are two places that I specifically remember it talking about a Virtuous One, as in a woman. The first is in Ecclesiastes 7:27-28, where king Solomon expresses this deep lament about only being able to only find a Virtuous man, one in a thousand, but not so much with women at all. I don’t believe it to be a slam on women as much as it was about where he found himself and a enormous number of bad choices involving women. ☺️☺️Most people are much more familiar with proverbs 31 and the description laid out to what a Virtuous woman looks like. It’s kind of odd, but all of the descriptions of what manifest a Virtuous woman; none of them point to anything having to do with physical beauty or appearance. Nothing about beautiful eyes or long flowing hair, nothing about smooth or silky skin, absolutely nothing about shape, form or any kind of physical beauty. If the Bible doesn’t put an emphasis on physical beauty, then perhaps we shouldn’t so much either. A Virtuous woman is about inner beauty and inner strength. It’s much about how they approach life and how they take care of others. People don’t admire ,and are drawn to them because of outward looks, but because of the strong character exhibited in just moving through and doing life.
- I’m not always the best judge of anything, unless it has something to do with my taste buds☺️☺️, but beyond that, if God is not leading the way, then I’m about fifty /fifty on my own. In this case here I’m pretty sure that I’m spot on. My friend Amy was absolutely a looker☺️☺️, but she also possessed all of those inwardly beautiful and strong character strengths that mark a Virtuous woman. If you are unfamiliar with the 31st chapter of Proverbs, you might want to give it the once over and be thoroughly impressed ☺️☺️.
- Last week , I reminded you guys to just remember to breath In this climate of political uncertainty. This week I want you guys to remember the hurting. The one’s who have lost someone very close and very special to them. They may be wearing a smile that it took them well over an hour to muster up. They may be going through the motions and doing the things that seem customary or usual, the norms , but inside they are struggling, and each day, to just put those two feet on the ground as they exit the bed, is the equivalent of them running a marathon . Life for them is a struggle and often they really don’t know how to play the cards that life has dealt them. It may be a little easier to muster a smile in the immediate aftermath of loosing someone. People are coming along side, bringing food and sympathy cards, sharing hugs and hopefully words of encouragement and inspiration, which is sometimes just silence. As the days turn into weeks and months, people move on , but not so much for the ones with a huge whole in their heart, where a love one use to be. They are still there, in their hearts, but just not in the same way . We all greave differently and there is no set or correct or specified way of doing that. Sadly sometimes we get stuck. I say this with the utmost respect and caution, but if you have someone who has gotten stuck or been in a sad place for an extraordinary amount of time, it may be time to seek out a good grief councilor and there is absolutely no shame in that.
- It’s hard loosing anyone, but it’s especially hard when it’s your beloved child, regardless of the situation. Remember to check in, and do it until they check in on you, because that would be a sign of healing taking place.☺️. God is close to the hurting, the suffering and the broken hearted, He’s always close and probably closer than you could think or imagine 💔.
- Till Next Time ✌️ Peace!
- Sandy The Southerner
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