Chapter 32. Gifts and heartache

"You own everything that happened to you.

Tell your stories."

 - Anne Lamott

Life and gifts are part of our everyday, and so too are death and heartache.

Travel to Europe with Dad and siblings in early January is a good time, and Gregg gets major points for sending me a dozen roses on our 19^th anniversary while I’m away in Paris. I attempt to bring home the drying roses and tall beautiful vase protected by my pillow in my carry-on, but get stopped by Customs in Detroit and have to give up the roses. My naivety almost causes us to miss our connecting flight, but we send Mike to run ahead and ask for the pilot to hold take off.

Heartache and despair are also with me, and I find respite in images of wings.

February 6, 1999

One of the visualizations that I’m fleshing out for myself and to share with women in May (for a talk, as You will Lord) is of Wings - flight, enfolding, softness, safety --

  Imagine - a warm blanket just out of the dryer, a goose down comforter completely surrounding you, the soft luxurious feel of fur or feathers against your skin, the feeling of safety when something or someone stronger than you supports and holds you, covers you...and now imagine that soft warm security as you relish the freedom that flight brings....imagine the thrill of riding on a ‘magic carpet’ enfolded by that warm and softness and safety, flying through the skies, able to go anywhere, do anything, released from all worries, relieved of all duties....set free.

- He will cover you with His pinions, and under His wings you may seek refuge; His faithfulness is a shield and bulwark.  Ps 91:4

-Keep me as the apples of the eye (the pupil, the daughter of the eye); Hide me in the shadow of Your wings.. Ps 17:8

-How often I wanted to gather your children together, the way a hen gathers her chicks under her wings.. Matt 23:37, Luke 13:34

-..under whose wings you have come to seek refuge... Ruth 2:12

-You yourselves have seen what I did to the Egyptians, and how I bore you on eagles’ wings, and brought you to Myself .. Ex 19:4

-...He (God) encircled him, He cared for him, He guarded him as the pupil of His eye. Like an eagle that stirs up its nest, that hovers over its young He spread His wings and caught them, He carried them on His pinions.  Deut 32:10b-11

-Those who wait for (hope in) the Lord will gain new strength; they will mount up with wings (sprout wings) like eagles, they will run and not get tired, they will walk and not become weary.  Isa 40:31

Riding on the wings – with a hope of flying someday – is a picture that touches me deeply. I am most weary, so a suggestion to “sink down in your weariness and ride on the wings of omnipotence” is one I latch onto.

“you know how the eagles are taught the use of their wings.  

See yonder cliff rising a thousand feet out of the sea.  

See high up a ledge on the rock, where there is an eagle’s nest with its treasure of two young eaglets.  

See the mother bird come and stir up her nest, and with her beak push the timid birds over the precipice. 

See how they flutter and fall and sink toward the depths.  

See how she ‘flutters over her young, spreads abroad her wings (Deut 32:11- as God does for each of us “that hovers over its young, He spread His wings and caught them, He carried them on His pinions), 

and so as they ride upon her wings, she brings them to a place of safety. And so she does once and again, each time casting them out over the precipice and then again taking and carrying them.

Yes, the instinct of that eagle mother was God’s gift, a single ray of that love in which the Almighty trains His people to mount as on eagles wings.  

She stirs up your nest.  

He disappoints your hopes.  

He brings down your confidence.  

He makes you fear and tremble, and all your strength fails and your feel utterly weary and helpless.  

And all the while He is spreading His strong wings for you to rest your weakness on.  

All He asks is that you should sink down in your weariness and wait on Him and allow Him to carry you as you ride upon the wings of His omnipotence.” 

– Andrew Murray

Images and words comfort me. 

So does medication, maybe? I wonder about the medication though, so continue to attempt to wean off of Zoloft.

Gregg finds comfort and assurances in therapy and from God in February, hearing

“that He has something special or big for you - that He will accomplish His desire in you.”  

Becky also finds some self-assurance as a ‘cool’ guy becomes interested in her. We throw her a surprise birthday party for her sweet 16^th, and get some sweet appreciation in her words to us:

"I'm in love with my parents."

But Dad is failing fast.

Mom & Dad's house, 305 College St, SL, IA (torn down in 2016)

All of George’s kids, mostly us girls, are taking turns staying with him, a shift of a few days at a time. On February 24, I write that Dad is no longer able to get out of bed and hasn't been able to for about a week, that he seems more disoriented, that he vomited the day before, that he’s having a harder time taking his meds orally, and that in general he’s more inward. It is awful watching it all happen and so hurtful to think of him and mom suffering. I write, “God is sustaining though....I am finding Him sufficient.”

March 7, 1999

I'm home from Sunday school - but will go to church - I'm battling a virus, I think; either that or exhaustion. I threw up a number of times last night and once this morning and feel a bit flu-ish (weak, headachy, shaky) but do want to go to church this morning and share with the congregation what God did in and for DAD! Many of those people were praying for him and want to enjoy the work that God did! It is such a wonderful story! 

That Sunday night, March 7, I call 'home' around 6 PM and find out that dad is doing poorly (worse than when I left him just the day before). 

I pack and get things wrapped up so that I can be gone most of the week (pretty sure he’s close to death), and call back before I leave Northfield. His lungs are filling up, his breaths are raspy, so I kinda know that I’m not going to make it home before he dies, but want to go right away anyway.  Gregg drives me down to Storm Lake (and then he drives back to Northfield the same night - getting back at 3:30 AM); he is so supportive and good to me through all this. 

Sunday, March 7, 1999, Dad dies at 9:45 PM. I walk into his bedroom, with Sarah McLachlan’s song “In the arms of an angel” playing, and go to his lifeless body for a final and unreturnable hug.

Monday and Tuesday has us kids tending to the surprisingly copious details of planning for the funeral and visitation. Visitation happens on Wednesday and funeral on Thursday, March 10, at 10:30 AM. 

Fri, March 12, 1999

We came back late last night. A couple of other sisters are staying with Mom this weekend. I will go to Storm Lake next weekend again, to lessen the time that Mom is alone.

It's been really sad - Dad was a good man and well liked and he will be greatly missed. He was so tender towards the end - I will miss that and what could have been, along with his often fun disposition. The grandkids too will so miss him - they wrote him goodbye notes that were tear-jerkers...