Catholic Hermit: So Much to Learn

The older I am, the less ready I realize my soul is for Jesus to utilize for the love He deserves.

Of course I know that I am not the one to make that judgment call; but I guess in another way to express it:  I am recognizing all the more my failings on a daily basis.  Perhaps age becomes a weakness not only in body and mind, but in ability and strength to do right.

Increasingly I grasp what St. Paul meant when he succinctly stated (but not in the clumsy way I am writing) that he wants to do right but ends up doing wrong.  Unintentional errors seem on the increase with increasing years, and the ability to be circumspect about the past is indirectly correlated to weakening physical eyesight.

Last week when a spinal headache heralded the dawn, my mind crescendoed with details niggling and irritating my mind and emotions while at the same time knowing that I was not at all handling much with several of the seven-fold gifts of the Holy Spirit.  [Wisdom, understanding, counsel, fortitude, knowledge, piety, and fear of the Lord] 

Or at least even at the time, it seemed that way.  I struggled to understand others' perspectives, yet it was ultra-frustrating with the intensity of the head pain to live in the theological virtues of faith, hope, and charity.  I lacked the charity in losing faith that God would work matters out with some relationships.  I lacked wisdom in my perspective and thoughts regarding some, and I lacked three of the cardinal virtues: prudence, temperance, and justice.

At the time, I was of course unable to think of theological or cardinal virtues.  They are just coming to me now, in reflection, after the spinal headache has cleared and also after the recent ordeal of wood particles painfully in my eyes.

As to the latter trial, I could do nothing but wait and put out in some general messages on a personal social media account, that I needed prayers.  I could not get sawdust out of my eyes; I had no means of getting transportation to civilization for help.  I had to wait and trust in God to provide whatever human assistance.  I had to try to understand what aspects in others resulted in the wait and to respect how it would be from their standpoint.

The first night of the  ordeal (which can make one frantic from such small bits of wood nearly imperceptible to the human eye if one can use the eyes to see at that point!), the Lord provided a dream in which my grandmother appeared amidst many other, I assume, relatives and friends long departed from this earth.  My grandmother is the personage who stood out in the dream, and since I'd not seen her in the spirit realm in many temporal years, this reconnoitering was reassuring and blessed!  She did not need to speak in temporal words; her message of calm came in essence.

Finally came a much-needed offer to drive me to civilization to get medical help for the eyes.  To my surprise, an eye specialist made room to fit me in immediately; however even with that, I had to wait a few hours for the person giving me the ride to fulfill what was scheduled.  Although I knew if others felt the pain in my eye, all else would be dropped to hie-thee-to-an-eye-doctor, that other aspects blur our vision, so to speak, to be able to relate to that degree to overcome our idiosyncracies.

So the triage nurse, who had called me to find out more details of what happened regarding my eye incident, accepted that I had to wait until after noon to be driven there and accommodated me accordingly.  And I had to accept it also, although I hoped that if I were needed that I'd set aside my plans and would rise to immediate assistance.  But perhaps I'd not.  And surely in the past I had not.  In fact--just right now popped into my mind an incidence in which I ignorantly did not realize the immediate need of someone waiting for me to bring Holy Communion to them--'twas years ago but brought to mind right now!

The ophthalmologist chided me for not coming in immediately, the morning after the eye incident, but I said I simply had to wait until there was a human means to come; I did not have thousands for an ambulance ride.  (And that is helpful in somewhat understanding why many people forego medical procedures, do not keep their teeth in good shape, live on the streets....)  Yet it was not a perspective he much tolerated in his own perspective based upon his given career mindset.

On the return drive back to Te Deum Hermitage, with the person who took six hours out of scheduled day to do the incredibly kind deed, I learned part of the person's background which helped me immediately understand aspects that had prickled the week before when addled by the spinal headache.  Just a bit of understanding and knowledge helped me grasp others' traits and the reason for them.

In fact, there was a terrible eye incident shared, but the passage of time somehow dims our view of the immediacy of pain when the pain is in another's current experience.

I am reminded of the Scripture in which we are told to take the plank out of our own eye rather than to dwell on the splinter in another's eye.

From last week's spinal headache in which my own lack of temperance, brutal counsel of another, lack of understanding (even if I struggled to understand)--to this week's lesson in waiting for further instruction in both theological and cardinal virtues--I can "see" how God mercifully brings answers and softly humbles.  

He teaches, always.  Jesus has never stopped being the Master Teacher.  And I have so much to learn, always.  More than ever.