20 and 90

This has been a tough week, much like spending time between the proverbial
"rock and a hard place". Just plain stony hard, serious, exasperating, and exhausting. I know the days could be so much worse so I acknowledge that "this" experience is nothing, compared. I'm reminded again that life is so fragile, so precious; Tim Russert's untimely death yesterday of a myocardial infarction and ventricular arrhythmia is a sober acknowledgment that none of us has any guarantee of our next day, or even our next minute. Wishing desperately that I could know this from deep within and not take anything for granted or seek to change everything, bending it my way.

But, sitting in the midst of tiresome, seeming never-ending challenge, life sometimes just doesn't feel good. The phrase, "this too shall pass" is certainly true but lately it seems the good things pass and the not-so-good stick around for awhile, tenaciously attached like an annoying gnat. There must be lessons to be learned from this irritation. I'm thinking the lessons are right before my eyes and perhaps in the form of the prayer of Saint Francis of Assisi whose words resonate deeply with me.

Those in my life who are at the extremes of age (20 and 90) tax me mightily. My love for them is endless, unchangeable, forever. Bedrock.

But, the path right now is rugged. Both in the last days have asked me the same question, "Do you think I'm an idiot?" Different contexts but the same question. I pause to wonder; that they both found my inquiries annoying and inappropriate says something about me. I have much to learn and ask for grace. I have no experience; who ever does? We just move along the best we can because each moment is new, untrodden territory.

Lord, make me an instrument of your peace.
Where there is hatred, let me sow love;
Where there is injury, pardon;
Where there is doubt, faith;
Where there is despair, hope;
Where there is darkness, light;
Where there is sadness, joy.

O divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek
To be consoled as to console,

To be understood as to understand,
To be loved as to love;
For it is in giving that we receive;
It is in pardoning that we are pardoned;
It is in dying to the self that we are born to eternal life.

Saint Francis of Assisi