High Speed Train

Christmas and New Year´s have passed me by.

It´s as if a high speed train would pass in front of me and I would stand there watching it from a distance only to feel a deafening silence and emptiness once the train had disappeared out of sight.

Here I stand, enveloped by the silence of the vast openess that surrounds me and all I am aware of is the ache of disappointment and resignation that resides in my heart.

An overwhelming desire to escape consumes me as my logic can no longer battle against the pain in my heart. It finds no sense to continue and no reason to fight. Year in and year out all my efforts have been futile and my results wanting. How long can the heart withstand? How long can the soul fight failure?

The Bible talks about a hope deferred making the heart sick. My heart is sick. I have not abanonded ship, but the storm is in process. I am waiting for God. I need to learn how to live with this disappointment and not let it steal my hope...although right now .....it feels like it has! Each day gives me the chance to, little by little, grasp on to God inspite of my present state of mind and soul.

I would have like to have been more my jolly self and inspire you over Christmas with light and life, but I am being true to my present state. I am trusting by faith that maybe in a few tomorrows´s my inner self with live up to God´s reality in my life.

My battle

This Friday my sister and I did our Red Cross visits in a town close by here. It was really nice to see them after the summer break, and they are always sooooooooooo happy to chat and catch up!

There is a couple that we used to visit that now have moved into a Nursing Home and no longer use the pendant/telephone services that the Red Cross provides, but we decided to look them up in their new home anyway.

What I didn't count on when visiting them was that I would be flooded with the negative memories of my time working in the nursing home. Click here for my post when I worked in the nursing home. It took all I had to ignore those feelings while we visited them . Because they were so happy to see us, I was able to survive our visit pretty well.

Needless to say, when we left, I felt overcome by feelings of sadness and failure. I was glad my sister was with me. I didn't feel like crying... when it hurts so bad sometimes it goes beyond the crying feeling if you know what I mean. It was a hit below the belt!

Since then I have been fighting against these feelings and gone over what I could have done, what I should have done...you know those mind games you play somehow hoping by doing so you can change history.

I am sick at how quick I am to believe the worst about myself. It is easy to just somehow get lost in the overwhelming feeling of it all. What makes it worse is we are in financial straights at present and the need for me to get employment adds pressure to this whole panorama.

I would appreciate your prayers and that God would do a work in me and provide the job I need to be able to keep our heads above water!!!! Thanks!

The Cracked Water Pot

A water bearer in India had two large pots, each hung on each end of a pole which he carried across his neck.

One of the pots had a crack in it, and while the other pot was perfect and always delivered a full portion of water at the end of the long walk from the stream to the master's house, the cracked pot arrived only half full.

For a full two years this went on daily, with the bearer delivering only one and a half pots full of water in his master's house.

Of course, the perfect pot was proud of its accomplishments, perfect to the end for which it was made. But the poor cracked pot was ashamed of its own imperfection, and miserable that it was able to accomplish only half of what it had been made to do.

After two years of what it perceived to be a bitter failure, it spoke to the water bearer one day by the stream. "I am ashamed of myself, and I want to apologize to you."

"Why?" asked the bearer. "What are you ashamed of?"

"I have been able, for these past two years, to deliver only half my load because this crack in my side causes water to leak out all the way back to your master's house. Because of my flaws, you have to do all of this work, and you don't get full value from your efforts," the pot said.

The water bearer felt sorry for the old cracked pot, and in his compassion he said, "As we return to the master's house, I want you to notice the beautiful flowers along the path."

Indeed, as they went up the hill, the old cracked pot took notice of the sun warming the beautiful wild flowers on the side of the path, and this cheered it some.

But at the end of the trail, it still felt bad because it had leaked out half its load, and so again it apologized to the bearer for its failure.

The bearer said to the pot, "Did you notice that there were flowers only on your side of your path, but not on the other pot's side? That's because I have always known about your flaw, and

I took advantage of it. I planted flower seeds on your side of the path, and every day while we walk back from the stream, you've watered them. For two years I have been able to pick these beautiful flowers to decorate my master's table. Without you being just the way you are, he would not have this beauty to grace his house."

The moral of this story is:
Each of us has our own unique flaws.

We're all cracked pots. But it's the cracks and flaws we each have that make our lives together so very interesting and rewarding.

You've just got to take each person for what they are, and look for the good in them.

There is a lot of good out there.

There is a lot of good in you! Blessed are the flexible, for they shall not be bent out of shape.

Remember to appreciate all the different people in your life!

To bite off more than one can chew!

To try to do something that is too difficult. If you bite off more than you can chew, you try to do more than you are able to.

Do your best. Do whatever you can, but don't bite off more than you can chew.

It has been busy since I last wrote...a trip to Guernsey, visitors and then beginning the practical of my studies at a Nursing home nearby.

I wish I could say that I am plodding away through my practical, enduring.... but I can only share that after one week I had to terminate this initiative.

Stuck between a rock and a hard place: to "abort" my practical with all the feelings of failure etc that accompany such a decision, and or to continue working in this situation that inspired such worry and anxiety to the extent that I wasn´t eating or sleeping??? It was a case of Hobson´s Choice! What was the lesser of the 2 evils?

On May 14th I started my first day in the Nursing Home and sadly instead of being a "shadow" to a profesional I was pretty much left to sink or swim. Thrown in the deep end as it were to fulfill the tasks of an auxiliary. It was frightening to say the least!

One is not dealing with mere files or books that can be moved about with out fear of damage or rather if they do get lost or harmed; no lives are at stake. But when you are dealing with people, this prospect takes on a whole different persepective plus a tremendous weight of responsability. I found this and other experiences I encountered there to be overwhelming....

One size too big!

I realized that this was not where I wanted to be headed....just like becoming an astronaut and experiencing G force is not on my 10 things I want to do before I die list!

I want to "be" with the dear ones and interact with them & somehow bring sunshine into their day but instead I found myself on a sort of factory line moving pieces from here to there and the more you get done the better.

The pace was intense because of lack of staff. I hasten to add that although they didnt acommpany me as they should; each one of those auxiliaries deserves a medal for the way in which they fulfill their duties with the limited time and energy they have. I take my hat off to them.

I recognize that I personally had reached my limits. Do I struggle with a sense of failure? Yes I do! I like to finish what I start.

Yet, I must be big enough to see that I am not super woman and this was just one size too big for me. I guess my pride has suffered a blow. I must not confuse passion with capacity and it is important to be level headed and honest with myself about my ability to step into this role. After all it´s not every ones thing.

I am encouraged though that I gave it a fair go... To recognize ones shortcomings is not an end, but rather a new opportunity to redefine the initial dream and the way to realize that dream. I have to keep persuing the dream...and try another via....

I am finding rest and peace in the comfort and support (especially from my husband and kids) that many have given me both in my initiation to study after 20 years and now in this moment where I have had to stop the practical. Inspite of my sadness, I do not feel without hope. I say with dear Alfred Lord Tennyson:

I hold it true, whate'er befall;

I feel it, when I sorrow most;

'Tis better to have loved and lost

Than never to have loved at all.