Looking Ahead

I found out pretty early on that Mama was adventurous and a lot of fun.  She also knew how to make the best of a bad situation.  I’m pretty sure that she was almost always that way.  When Mama was twelve years old, she decided to teach herself how to drive.  She was at Nanny’s house.  Nanny was her grandmother and my great-grandmother.  Mama got in the car and took off.  Not too far into her maiden voyage, she ran into the mailbox and knocked the post out of the ground.  Nanny could have had a major fit and Mama could have been in big trouble.  Instead, Nanny just looked at the mess and said, “Run get our bait can – there are lots of worms in this hole and we’re going fishing!”  Nanny knew all about that business of making lemonade out of lemons.  Mama gave up on being a self taught driver.  She didn’t learn how to drive until my older brother was in the first grade.  There’s another story about that. 

Unlike Mama, I wasn’t the least bit interested in learning how to drive.  When we were teenagers, my friends were anxious to learn to drive and get a license.  Not me.  The whole idea could not have been more unappealing.  I signed up for Driver’s Ed in school.  Hated it.  Hated it.  Hated it.  Didn’t get a driver’s license and felt somewhat fortunate and a lot relieved to have escaped with my life.  I actually made an A in that class.  Go figure – our grade was based on tests, not driving.

Time went by and I graduated from high school.  Without a driver’s license.  I started college.  Without a driver’s license.  I was an anomaly, but I was a very resourceful anomaly.  I always got where I needed to be.

If it hadn’t been for my brother’s best friend, I might still be bumming rides.  The three of us – my brother, Ricky (brother’s best friend), and I had gone to Deatsville to look at a snake.  (Yep – that’s another story, too.)  I don’t remember why, but we were in two vehicles and I was riding with Ricky.  On the way back, he said, “You can drive.”  What?!  Oh no I can’t.  No.  No.  No.  Bad idea.  Really bad idea. But he was persistent.  He said he knew I could do it and he would help.  So, with a white-knuckled death grip on the steering wheel – at 10 o’clock and 2 o’clock, of course – I headed onto the interstate.  God, please don’t let me get us killed.  Please help me.  PLEASE!!

And then Ricky said, “Where are you looking when you drive?”  Well, of all the dumb questions!  Where do you think I’m looking?!  He kept on, “Are you looking at the road right in front of the car?”  I said, “Yes.”  He said, “OK, that’s the thing we have to fix.  Look farther down the road at where you are going – that lets you really drive to where you want to be.”  I tried it.  Oh my goodness!  What a difference.  Driving was a piece of cake when I looked ahead instead of three feet in front of the bumper.  Who knew?!  Two weeks later, I got my driver’s license.  I was eighteen.  Really. Since then, I’ve had lots of chances in my life to employ my number one driving rule – look ahead to where you are going.  That’s how this cancer journey has been.  A year ago, I started looking ahead to where I wanted to be.  Done with chemo.  Done with Herceptin.   Done with radiation.  Cancer-free.  Getting on with my life.

Easy?  Nope.  Not even close.  But, so much easier than it could have been.  I spent my time doing as much looking ahead and looking up as I could.  God knew all along what I was going through.  He had it all under control, even when I didn’t.  My next surgery is Monday, May 14^th.  Reconstruction and port removal!  Woohoo!

All along, my prayer has been that I will learn what God has to teach me through this experience and that He will show me how to use it to help someone else.  I am amazed at the opportunities He has given me to help others in some small way.  I know for sure that it truly can be the small things that bring the most encouragement.  My prayer isn’t about doing something big.  It’s about not wasting this cancer.  It’s about doing what He has planned, no matter how insignificant it may seem to me.

Cancer doesn’t feel like a blessing.  The opportunities you get in the midst of cancer – well, that’s the blessing.  And I don’t want to miss any of them.

Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.  James 1:2

The Real Thing!

 

My grandmother taught me to love Coca-Cola as much as she did.  When I stayed with her, she always made sure to have Cokes and Little Debbie Snack Cakes on hand.  Not the greatest diet, I know, but grandmothers aren’t generally known for broccoli and salads.  My grandmother believed in the power of Little Debbie Snack Cakes.  She preferred the Oatmeal Creme Pies.  We had a dog that took a pill every day because he was allergic to wet grass.  Seriously.  There were times when my grandmother kept him for us.  She would give him his little tiny pill inside an entire Little Debbie Oatmeal Creme Pie.  She was his grandmother, too, I suppose, so he got the royal treatment just like I did.  He certainly never kicked up a fuss about staying with her.

My grandmother had a significant hearing loss.  She was deaf in one ear and had to have a hearing aid for the other one.  So, she sometimes missed things that happened because she didn’t hear well.  We were visiting her one weekend and my brother slipped in the bathroom and hit his head.  He was bleeding and Mama and Daddy were trying to decide if he needed stitches.  I was jumping up and down trying to see how much blood there was.  My grandmother had missed it all.  She came down the hall, saw all the commotion, and I told her that my brother fell and got hurt.  And his head was bleeding!  She immediately said, “David, I’ll fix you a Coke!”  That was her cure-all – the antidote for anything that ails you.  And she promptly brought David a glass of Coke loaded with ice.  He didn’t end up with stitches, just butterfly band-aids.  I guess the Coke worked.

Well, here I am again at the Cancer Center.  As odd as it may seem, this a very comforting place to be.  Strange, I know. But this place is actually very peaceful for me.  This is where I always talk to God.  Not just about cancer, but about other things, too.  I always start out thanking Him for healing me and then I move on to other things.  And I always end by asking Him to help me use this experience for something good – to help someone, to give someone hope, to provide some encouragement, to do whatever He wants me to do and to learn whatever He wants me to learn.  I will not waste this cancer!

If my grandmother were still here, she would bring me a Coke and a Little Debbie Oatmeal Creme Pie.    She would always say, “I know what you need.” And the snacks would appear.  Whatever she brought, it always made me feel better.  God is like that, too.  Right in the middle of cancer, He gives me just what I need to feel better.  He is just kind of amazing that way.

Mechanic on Duty

I went to lots of different schools I when I was growing up – seven of them from first grade until I graduated.  Through most of my elementary school years, we lived close enough so that I could walk to school.  Walking to school was not a chore for me – I actually enjoyed it.  When I was in the second grade, I walked to school past a gas station that had a garage attached.  There was a sign out front that said, “Mechanic on duty.”  I had no idea who “Mechanic” was, but it made me feel better and safer somehow just knowing that whoever that happened to be was “on duty.”  I even had a picture in my mind of what “Mechanic” would look like.

One Saturday morning, I was going shopping with my grandmother and we drove past a different gas station.  Guess what I saw out front.  A sign that said, “Mechanic on duty.”  What?!  Mechanic has moved!! Mechanic is now on duty somewhere else!  Is anybody on duty at “my” gas station?  It was a terrible feeling.  Mechanic had let me down and jumped ship.  Why on earth would Mechanic do that?  I needed Mechanic to be “on duty” when I walked back and forth to school.  It was a mystery to me.  What in the world was going on with Mechanic?

So, I decided to ask Daddy about it. I figured my Daddy could help me understand it if anybody could.   I told him about Mechanic being on duty at my gas station and how they advertised it with a sign right out front.  I told him how Mechanic had left me in the cold and moved on to another gas station.  Only, I didn’t have a clue what “mechanic” was, and I pronounced it me-chan-ick.  And I was pretty upset with Mechanic for leaving me in the lurch and not being on duty for me.  Good grief!  Anything could happen if Mechanic wasn’t on duty!  I didn’t know what that might be, but I figured it could be something pretty awful.  Walking to school just wouldn’t be the same.

Daddy explained to me what “mechanic” actually meant.  Are you kidding me?  That’s a person who works on the cars, not someone protecting us?  Who knew?  And there’s more than one Mechanic?!  So, “my” Mechanic is still there!  On duty still, for all the good it would do me.  I was relieved and irritated all at the same time.  It was so nice to know that Mechanic had not deserted me after all.  But, it sure was disappointing to find out that he wasn’t there to offer any kind of protection and that whole “on duty” business hadn’t meant anything even close to what I had thought.  Oh, well.  Walking to school would just be a little riskier.  Good thing that Stubby, my dog, walked to school with me every day.  He might just have to be a stand-in for Mechanic if it came to it.

Aren’t you glad that you don’t have to worry that God might be “on duty” somewhere else when you need Him?  I know that I am.  And I need Him.  Frequently.  Knowing that Mechanic was on duty was a source of comfort for me.  Knowing that God is everywhere is an even greater source of comfort.  I know that wherever I go and whatever my circumstances may be, I am NEVER out of God’s reach.  Nobody will ever have to "stand in" for God.  I know it because He promised me.  He promised you, too!  And while I sit here in the Cancer Center getting my latest treatment, I know He is right here with me.  On duty.

When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and through the rivers, they will not overflow you. When you walk through the fire, you will not be scorched, nor will the flame burn you.  Isaiah 43:2

I will never desert you, nor will I ever forsake you.  Hebrews 13:5

Where can I go from your Spirit? Or where can I flee from your presence? If I ascend into heaven, you are there; if I make my bed in hell, behold, you are there; if I take the wings of the morning and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there your hand shall lead me, and your right hand shall hold me. If I say, "Surely the darkness will hide me and the light become night around me," even the darkness will not be dark to you; the night will shine like the day, for darkness is as light to you.  Psalm 139:7-10

Santa Claus, Watercolors, and God

We were living in Mobile when I was five years old.  It was getting close to Christmas and I was excited.  My Christmas list was done.  I knew what I wanted Santa Claus to bring me and I just couldn’t wait.  And then Mama gave me the news.  She thought I would be thrilled.  I wasn’t.  She said that we were going to Montgomery to spend Christmas with my grandmother.  What?!  I need to be at home for Christmas!  This is terrible!! Santa Claus knows I live here, but he will never find me in Montgomery!!  But I didn’t say any of that.  I just cried.  And cried.  Mama was mystified.  I ordinarily loved going to my grandmother’s for any reason at all.  I would even invent reasons that I needed to go visit her.  But not now!  Not at Christmas.  

I finally told Mama why I didn’t want to go.  She told me that it wouldn’t matter and that Santa would find me no matter where I was at Christmas.  I was less than convinced.  I decided that the safest thing I could do was leave him a note.  That way, if he showed up in Mobile, he would find the note, know I was in Montgomery, and just swing by my grandmother’s house to leave my loot. Seemed like a good plan to me.  So I got my brother to help me with the note.  I figured he had as much to gain from that note as I did.  If Santa couldn’t find me, then he certainly wouldn’t find my brother either.  Our note was to the point – We are at Mam-ma’s house and you can leave our presents there.  Love, Susan and David How could he not find us with those explicit directions?

So, off we went to Montgomery.  The note was taped to the mantel so Santa could not miss it when he plopped into our fireplace.  Things were looking up.  On Christmas Eve, I got my grandmother to help me with a second note for Santa.  It was also pretty much to the point and went something like Susan and David are here. You are in the right house now. I got an early start on my note-writing obsession.

Santa found us!  On Christmas morning I was thrilled.  The one thing I wanted more than anything was a giant watercolor set.  It had seventy-two colors and lots of brushes and paper.  The box was about the size of a Monopoly game and it had a hinged lid.  I painted like crazy.  I even touched up a couple of places on the wall at my grandmother’s house.  I distinctly remember that nobody appreciated it.  

Sometimes I think we have a tendency to treat God like Santa Claus.  Tell him what you want and wait for him to bring it.  We know better.  But they do have something in common.  Just like Santa, God always knows where his children are.  We don’t have to leave him notes so he can find us, either.  He is always there – He sees you when you’re sleeping and He knows when you’re awake.  He knows if you’ve been good or bad.  He knows how we handle everything life throws at us – and He knows that we sometimes pout.  And He loves us.  Completely and unconditionally.  

I am at the Cancer Center again.  Waiting.  Waiting. Waiting.  Today I see the doctor and next week I have a Herceptin treatment.  While I wait, I am sure that God is watching over me.  He has been with me every step of this journey and has been fighting even when I can’t.  He will do that for you, too.  You don’t need a medical crisis or another type of emergency or a catastrophe.  He will be right with you in the “ordinary” as well as the stressful.  Ask Him.  That’s all it takes.  He WANTS to be there and do good things for you!

Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us – Ephesians 3:20

The Beverly Hillbillies

Starting when I was in the first grade, my grandmother and I shared a room for a while.  After my grandfather died, she moved in with us.  I loved it.  My grandmother for a roommate!  I was in heaven.  They told me it was just temporary, and I knew she would move out, but I loved every minute of having her there.  I begged her to buy the house next door to us.  It wasn’t for sale, but I considered that a minor detail to overcome.  A lady named Mrs. Pace lived there with her daughter, Miriam.  I asked them if they would like to sell their house and move because I knew someone who needed it.  They were not particularly receptive to the idea.  And of all things, they told on me to my mother.  But, I needed to keep my grandmother close.  She ended up buying a house around the corner from us.  It was so close that I could walk over to see her.  

I loved spending the night with my grandmother.  On Fridays, she would come by and pick me up after work.  We would go to Winn Dixie and shop for my favorite foods before we went to her house.  I didn’t really care where we went – it was all an adventure for me.  Even Winn Dixie was exciting when I went there with my grandmother.  She had a chair in her house that would spin all the way around and she would let me play in as long as I wanted to.  

There were lots of times when I would almost spend the night with her.  This is how it happened.  My grandmother and I loved the Beverly Hillbillies.  We would have the best time laughing at Granny when she thought an ostrich was a big chicken or at Jethro when he would start “ciphering” and saying “Naught times naught…”  I would just about roll in the floor laughing.  

So on Beverly Hillbillies night, I went to my grandmother’s.  She would pick me up after work and I would be armed with my pajamas and Cheetos.  We would cook something to eat and then I would take a bath and put on my pajamas.  I would also rub Jergens lotion all over my hands, just like my grandmother.  We would have a good time just waiting for the Beverly Hillbillies to come on.  Sometimes we did things like shell peas.  If it was fruitcake season, we picked out pecans.  My grandmother made a fruitcake that people who hate fruitcake actually liked.  Sometimes we wrote notes to her sisters and I would get to add my greeting – How are you? I am fine. I went to school today.  I wasn’t much of a letter writer back then.

When the Beverly Hillbillies (brought to us by Kellogg’s of Battle Creek) finally came on, I broke out the Cheetos and my grandmother fixed me a Coke.  We ate, drank, and laughed out loud.  My grandmother thought Jed was handsome.  I thought Ellie Mae was beautiful and I wanted a chimpanzee just like hers.  I asked for one every Christmas.  Never got one.  Every time that doorbell rang in the mansion, I knew what was coming and I still laughed like it was the first time.  When the ending song came on, I sang along with it and then they were gone for another week.  My grandmother would take me home in my pajamas.  I just loved almost spending the night.  

Sometimes I wonder if God gave me that special grandmother because He knew how much I would need her after my mother died.  There are times when I think back and am so thankful for the wonderful memories I have.  It amazes me when I think that God has been there for me through every one of those memories – good and bad.  Sitting in the cancer center today getting a treatment, I can’t help thinking about this cancer journey of mine and how God might want me to use it.  I am still trying to figure it out and I pray about it often. 

Don’t ever forget that God is always faithful.  Your circumstances don't matter.  Good times or not so good - He is there.  He is with you no matter what your journey includes – cancer or not.  

But you remain the same and your years will never end.  Psalm 102:27

The Milk Amplifier

I am pretty sure that I was born with milk-hating genes. I have never, ever liked milk. My brother loved it, but not me. I don’t like the taste of it or how it clogs up my throat. Yuck. Daddy came from a long line of milk-loving folks and he believed that children needed milk, so he insisted that I drink it. There was lots of drama at supper time at our house. Sitting at that table until I drank my milk was torture. I would finally have to put it back in the refrigerator, get it cold again, hold my nose, and drink it all at once. I still hate milk.

Since milk drinking was considered an essential function of childhood at my house, Mama tried to find a way to make it tolerable. Have you ever heard of Bosco? It has been around since 1928 and originally it was called a “milk amplifier.” I’m not kidding. Bosco is nothing more than chocolate syrup loaded with iron. Anyway, by the time I came along, Bosco had dropped that milk amplifier gimmick and just went with the chocolate syrup sales pitch. They did still insist that it made milk palatable. So, Mama tried it. She bought Bosco and added it to my milk and even though I still didn’t like it, I could get it down. Loved the Bosco. Hated the milk. So you will know, Bosco is still made in New Jersey. It is mostly sold in New York, Florida, Texas, and southern California. But, it is also sold in Europe Asia, and the Middle East. You can even order it on Amazon. Really. Or from Bosco’s website for $2.00 a bottle. I am not kidding about any of this. You should try it if you like chocolate.

Anyway, Mama believed in hanging clothes outside on a clothesline to dry. And Mama did a lot of clothes washing, so there were always lots of clothes to hang out or bring in. We had a neighbor who once told Mama that she either had the cleanest or the dirtiest children in the world. He based that on all the clothes hanging out to dry. One afternoon Mama was making a quick trip to the clothesline to bring in a few towels. She decided to leave us inside because lugging children down a flight of stairs and then back up again would take twice as long as just running to the clothesline and back. Mistake. Bad mistake.

While Mama was gone, my brother and I got into the Bosco. He was going to have chocolate milk and I was going to have straight Bosco. It was a doomed plan from the beginning. We got chairs so we could climb up, stand on the counter top, reach the cabinets, and grab the Bosco. We were squatting on the counter top and squirting Bosco into a glass to make chocolate milk when disaster struck. We missed the glass. And part of the counter top. Bosco ended up all over the counter and on the floor. We used our chairs and climbed down . . . and managed to step in the Bosco every time we moved. We made another bad decision. We decided to clean it up. With towels from the bathroom. So we tracked chocolate footprints all over the kitchen, through the house and into the bathroom. And then we smeared Bosco all over the floor with the help of those towels. About the time we had made the biggest mess we could make in our effort to clean up, Mama came through the door. Oh, boy. The only good thing I can say about the Bosco incident is that no matter what kind of mess we made from that point on, Mama would always say, “Well, at least it isn’t as bad as the Bosco.”

Do you sometimes try to fix things in your life and end up making a mess? I do. And I don’t learn quickly, because I just keep on doing it. God must look at me sometimes and think, “Ok, now, we are approaching Bosco proportions so be careful.” All He really wants us to do is depend on Him. I struggle. I want to depend on Him, but I seem to see a way to hurry things along, so I just handle it myself. The results are usually about what you would expect. Sometimes, though, there is no way for me to do anything else except lean on Him. That’s where I am right now - depending on Him to handle everything. It’s a good feeling to know that He is on duty. One way or another, I’m going to learn this lesson.

I think that chemotherapy and radiation may be my new measuring stick for unpleasantness. Mama had Bosco and I have cancer treatment. I’m pretty sure cancer treatment trumps Bosco.

But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong. 2 Corinthians 12:9-10