Time Well Spent--Part 1, What Does It Look Like

Time from the moment we walked into the ER until my daughter was released after emergency surgery--24 hours.

I had plans for those 24 hours. It was the week before Thanksgiving, and I was going to bake pumpkin bread for neighbors, make pie to freeze for Thanksgiving dinner, clean the house, grocery shop, and other really important things. We all know what Thanksgiving is supposed to look like, and these things were necessary for that to happen, so these were very important things to get done. After all, what happens if we don't do life like it's supposed to be done, like others expect it to be done? What happens when others look at us and expect us to be doing Thanksgiving when we are just thankful to...be healing?

I'll tell you what happens because I know what happens.

Life goes on.

The world does not end because there is no turkey on the table. The revolution around the sun continues whether there is cranberry sauce or not. Peanut butter sandwiches keep the orbit in groove as well as left over ham sandwiches do.

Life goes on.

What do people think? Frankly, most folks don't think about it at all. I feel very confident that well over 99% of the people on this planet never gave one thought to our Thanksgiving. We just aren't that important on a global scale. Of the people who did think about us, there were most likely three groups: the group who were glad all of us were home and healing on Thanksgiving, the group who thought about how to help us heal, and the group who thought about how our healing inconvenienced them.

The real issue--what really has any impact at all on me--is what I think.

I think the people who rejoiced that my daughter was healing are a gift.
I think the people who asked how to help the healing did more for us in the grocery runs, dinner drop-offs, and transportation than they can know.
I think the people who find us inconvenient spend enough time thinking about themselves and their lives that they are covered and I need not expend my energy--mental or emotional--on them.
And...

I think healing is time well spent.