Getting Loose

Being Used

Since I am retired, once a month or so, I volunteer to put in some time toward helping the staff out with pastoral care needs. While Marvin UMC is a big church (3000+ members), we are tilted toward the upper end of the age spectrum. Hence there are far more pastoral care needs to attend to than the clergy on the staff can possibly get done.

Each time when I set out to do this, there are usually 30 names or so to choose from. I try to see who has had some minimal pastoral care work in the last 30 days, and then I set out to write three people, call three people, and visit three people. I never really know who I am going to pick in these categories ahead of time.

One of the people I called had cancer. They were trying a stem cell replacement in their bone marrow. It's really dicey. I shared that I also was undergoing cancer treatment. They immediately opened up about how hard it was on them. Having to be in Dallas for 7 more weeks as they had to be within half an hour of the hospital if things suddenly went bad. It was like being in prison in some ways. They apologized for getting into so much detail about their condition with me, and said they knew I didn’t call to listen to their troubles, and what did I really want? I said I wanted nothing from them. I knew they were on our prayer list and just wanted to touch base with them. They were surprised. When I call people, I rarely know if anything is wrong or not. All I really know is that they haven’t been in church for a while.

Another person that I actually went to see, opened up about their fear that their child was an alcoholic. “Is pushing them down, really the best option?” That’s a tough one, because ordinarily the answer is, more often than not, a “yes” to that one. I said that this parent had to learn to become exceedingly well self-defined—to love their child, yes, but to not enable their child. I didn’t know where the conversation was going to go. I had never met this person in my life, yet I told them that in my last church that I pastored, we had an exceptional program in place to help women with their addictive issues.

When I volunteer every so many weeks, I never know what people I am going to meet or talk to, and it always surprises me that I might be the very person they need to hear an encouraging word from. In fact, I realize in those moments I am but a tool that God uses to reach out to others. That’s a very humbling position to be in.

The Good Physician

Man it was very, very tender to the touch.

My first thought was, "Man, I do not remember banging my head this bad!" Yet there was a slightly raised place on my skull like from a concussion, yet it felt a little crusty. I thought, "What is up with that? Psoriasis?"

Then I noticed above my sideburn there was the same thing. Then I noticed I had some hives by my eye and lip and on my cheek. So I tried 25 mg. of Benedryl. Didn’t even phase it. So before I went to work, I got some Claritin to deal with the wheals. Still nothing. It looked like a pimple or two was trying to form by my lower lip. I thought, "Have I been eating all that fat or greasy of foods? What is up with THIS?"

Next I began to notice some recurring shooting of pain on my head on these spots. And I thought, "Man, what is up WITH THIS?"

I went to bed after having taken some acetaminophen (which I rarely take), but about by 1 a.m., the shooting pain woke me up. And I thought, "Man, What is UP WITH THIS?" I could not go back to sleep. I did not know what to do. I began to think, "Man, I wonder if I have the shingles?"

But then I thought, "Why it can’t be the shingles. I’ve already had that shingles shot that all the old folks are supposed to take." Another shooting pain occurred, and I thought, "Man, what IS UP WITH THIS?"

I went to a web site and just tried to use it like a recipe book. I have these symptoms, tell me what I got. But wouldn’t you know it, I could find no such site. I thought, "Man, WHAT IS UP WITH THIS?"

Now, just to touch the scalp area was painful. The right side of my neck was swollen. I looked at myself in the mirror, and I said, "MAN, WHAT IS UP WITH THIS?"

I began to focus on that maybe I did have shingles after all. Nothing else made sense to me. Of course, I went to the dark side for a moment, and thought maybe I have some weird stage four cancer that is erupting. And then I thought, "Well, no. That is unlikely. I just had a well man physical. Something would have shown up in the blood work."

The pain was getting greater. I thought, "I wonder if I have any hydrocodones left over?" Eureka! I popped two into my mouth at about 3 a.m. Within 20 minutes I was drifting off to sleep.

I made an appointment to see my internist. He is a neat, very knowledgeable, board certified kind of a guy. I love our give and take and verbal sparring. He walked into the room and I said, "I just want to see if you are as good of a diagnostician as I am."

Not taking to it kindly he said, "Listen up! I am better than you are."

I said, "I hope you are, but I just wanted to see if you are at least as good as me. I’m guessing Herpes zoster."

He said, "I knew that before I even came into the room."

I said, "Oh, come on, give me a freaking break. You may be a doctor, but you are not a wizard. Oh, I get it, you heard it from one of your technicians whom I told her that that is what I thought I had!"

He said, "Wrong, camel breath. When I saw on the chart that you had some pain on the right side of your scalp and on top, I said to myself, I said, ‘That dude has shingles.’ When I walked into the door and saw your face my diagnosis was confirmed!"

I said, "Well, you really are a pretty good diagnostician."

Then I sat down and shut up and listened as he lectured me.

Kathryn

You learn a lot when you go to see someone, and just sit and listen. I love doing that very thing.

I had always known her as Kathryn. She has a rather serious look to her face. I know that she has traveled lots of miles so to speak in her journey of life.  She’ll admit it has been a pretty good one for her many decades.

But when she was much younger, she was Kate or Katie. I found that intriguing. All of a sudden a younger girl appeared who was full of life and activities that involved siblings and cousins—never mind whether they were first or second—they were kin and that is all that mattered.

She’s outlived two of the children she helped to rear. She has outlived two of her husbands, and some days are better than others.

She gets frustrated with her inability to precisely call a name or a date or a place, but the older I get, the more I sympathize.

But what really stunned me was that she was a Beckendorf. And that set of dogs is always related to each other through one way or another. Of course the one I knew the best was Harvey Beckendorf, a fellow clergyman. And then I found out there’s another Beckendorf who is pastoring a church in Beaumont under another name. I felt a kinship with her that I had not previously felt.

She was so appreciative of the visit. It made her day. She said, "You know, you can hardly find anyone anymore who cares about what it was like in days gone by."

But that is not me. I love to hear the stories of days gone by. I find myself, the older I get, ruminating around in my mind decades ago, reliving, dissecting, analyzing, wondering, puzzling about events that I feel certain most everyone else has forgotten about.  But somehow they linger brightly in my mind. Why that is so, I don’t really know.

The Ravages of Time

When I was little, I can remember on more than one occasion saying to my mother, "When you get old, I’ll take care of you."

She said, "Oh, I would love it if you did."

* * *

Sometimes it is not easy to willingly go gentle into that good night. Your physical apparatus begins to fail you not by changes in kind, but by changes in degree. A degree here, a couple of degrees there, and before long, you find yourself confused and wandering in a fog surrounded by familiar objects, but lacking a sure way of contextualizing all of them to make sense like they used to make sense.

She still has her ready laugh. She is sharp on the uptake. But there is a wobble in the short term memory. Asking things she had just asked about perhaps 10 minutes ago. Allowing others to do her thinking for her, instead of straining and working the old noodle to figure it out for herself.

"Well, maybe I’ll be where June is before too long."

"Why do you say that?"

"Well, what use am I? I can’t do what I used to do. I can’t move around like I used to to make cookies. I’m just not much help in the kitchen." And this is from a woman whose identity was bound up in doing and baking and cooking for others.

And I don’t have a comeback.

I’m not going to give false reassurance, and I listen and sift, and think "Why does she think that?" But then I further think, "If I were in her shoes . . . would I be thinking much differently?" I mean I could come in as the cheerleader and verbigerate at trying to restore one’s confidence, but would I want that done to me?

It’s got to be exasperating. She had so much life and vigor at one point. A workhorse who had unlimited energy, seemingly. Ready to get up and go.

I remember one time my mother-in-law commenting that she did not have half the energy that my mother did. She sat in awe of it.

Mom kept talking about if she only had access to a stove and pots and pans, but then they can’t allow that. Why, what if one of the residents were to leave a burner on. It is too dangerous.

Safety decisions are a killer. How can you take the right pills, if you don’t know what day it is? She can look back and recognize that she is in somewhat of a fog, and it perplexes her. How did it get to be this way?

So she sat a lot and watched and interacted where she could, but the hearing is not all what it used to be either.

We had her for six days, and I was glad to have her here, even though I still work a more than full-time job. I can remember that at my age my dad was retired, even my cousin was retired, but it will not be that way for me. I still have a few years to go before I can consider that option.

She and I think a lot on the same wavelength. Same sense of humor in so many ways. We can get so tickled with each other. I love pulling her leg. She always bites. That’s a lot of the fun, and I always play dumb.

I took her to Austin last Monday to meet my brother who carried her on out to San Angelo. We ate at Zoot there in Austin and had a pretty decent meal.

After lunch she climbed into his mini-van and sat while my brother and I transferred the luggage to the van. I went to the front seat and opened the door to kiss her good bye. And she gave me a look. A look that said, "I’m sorry I’m not what I used to be. I’m sorry I’m not as much help. I can never repay the time and the money and the kindness you have given me. I love you. You are my first born. I treasure you in ways you will never fully understand."

It is only now that I am unpacking what that look said. It is sad. It’s not what I want. It is not what she wants. But it is what it is.

If You Go to Church, You'll Live Longer

Every so often, these studies come out.  And if that isn't enough for you, here is another study that says that being an active member of a community of faith may well help you to recover better from a stroke.