Catholic Hermit: Anniversary Gift

I've texted the three adult children, essentially thanking them for being beloved treasures of life, despite all they've been put through when so young and into their adult lives.  Between one parent having left us in the lurch, and the other constantly trying to deal with chronic pain and the various flaws and weaknesses of all that makes up a human being, they have persevered.  I mentioned their courage and strength will see them through whatever else.  And much thanks, for they have meant so much in having kept me going despite suffering.  They are gifts!

Either I needed to force myself to get up from bed and walk, or give in to the pain.  Only between God and myself, have been these later years and the recent months.  So I resolved to make myself go for a walk, and praying along the way, once more placing myself in God's loving providence; the pain of walking felt a good change from the pain I now can call by its diagnosed name.  Lots of mysteries solved in these symptoms now, including that the body's physical energy can become trapped, causing disruption in electronic devices in the vicinity.

So that is how photos from my cell phone which was in the kitchen, one night got sent to four different persons!  Or so it would seem.  I certainly was not even near the phone all night; it was charging in the other room.  And I'd have no reason to send the same photos taken nearly a year ago!  Some humor, this is!

Giving myself over yet again to God while walking, I passed a man in a cul-de-sac who apologized for his truck sticking out a bit.  I like it when I am forced to walk a few extra steps and told the man as such; he then said he'd heard I had back pain.  I explained am recovering from back surgery but also have a condition that will continue to cause increasing pain, but that I decided I'd better make myself walk, with the hope that over time, I might be able to handle the added pain.

He said he and his wife had been talking, having seen me walking, that they'd like to be of any assistance possible.  His wife came outside about then, and invited me in to exchange phone numbers.  I was toward nearing the end of the best utilization of the pain medication, so one I talked more as is a typical mode of my distracting from pain when it is high and around others.  At least, I pointed out, that they know my situation with the back and the pain so they won't wonder or think it is going to lessen.  

The husband is going to be retiring soon, and he offered to do anything I need help with around my dwelling.  The one thing I did ask was if they go to a large store that sells in bulk--and yes they do--could they please call me next time they go, as if they could pick up a few items for me, I'd be very grateful.  Buying in bulk then keeps me from having to ask again for quite awhile.  And the next time I see them, or if she calls prior to going to that store, I can apologize and explain my chattering is only at times when pain is too much--just one of my distraction techniques, a coping mechanism.

Mercy, Lord.  Suffering does humble a person, often enough.  My sins are ever before me.

But the couple agree, that if I can keep walking, at least there is a chance that I can cope with the increasing pain.  One must be careful mentioning pain medication these days; it is so misunderstood by most people, even bias against those of us who are legitimate pain patients and for whom other interventions prove useless.  But I have agreed within, in the inner conversations with God, that I will stifle my pride in thinking I can do with less medication, and will increase to compensate for the pain when it rises as a result of walking.  Then I can lower it when not needed.

And what a gift from the Lord, this couple.  The woman a couple years younger than me, her husband five years younger than her.  How thoughtful and generous, and just seeing me walk by their subdivision several times, noticing the brace, and I think their neighbor was speaking with me awhile back, and their pups ran out and were jumping up.  I love dogs, and I did not mind the jumping, as I could not bend, of course, to pet them down low.  I mentioned the back trouble, no doubt.

I continue to pray for the long-time friend and husband, and I remain quite sorry that what I'd written was so offensive, which I can see it would be and why. I'm sorry it was even noticed, for whatever reasons, unless the Lord decides to bring some good from it.  I have been quite concerned, but about that which is not my place to have reacted to what is their business, their sad situation ongoing for a long time.  

That is true of another person recently, but who takes it better, my lack of filtering.  In these situations, there is nothing more to be done when people persist carrying their sideways crosses--crosses that are of our own doing, our own making.  Even continuing to carry these off-kilter crosses of situations that get heavier with time when not uprighted or dealt with--there is no point in discussing or repeating what is seen or even good advice that is not taken.  Give all over to God, these situations involving sideways crosses.  

And take a good look at any that could be sideways crosses in our own lives.  Perhaps my not wanting to increase pain meds so that perhaps I could manage pain better, is a sideways cross of sorts.  No one to blame but myself unless the walking causes more numbness of legs or debilitates, and not only increases pain. Or to not have good custody over self when pain gets too much.  Given my situation, I am definitely not being denied pain medication now as was the case for many years--crucial years when the children were young.

I'm improving a tad in trying to first consider the degree of pain in whatever moment, but sometimes I simply don't realize--such as when talking with the couple on nearby street this afternoon--just how severe is the pain.  This particularly occurs when I have been preoccupied for hours with interior conversations with God, as I had been today.  I don't have a full awareness of the pain when the circumstances suddenly change, and I am interfacing with people.

In God, there is always understanding from Him as to my thoughts and concerns.  He never wearies of however the pain is affecting me.  That is love.  That is pain.  That is love and pain melding together, in God's grace and love for me.  And the gift of this couple's offer to help me out if ever I need, is quite something, is it not?

It occurred not long after I had, while walking along, once again offered full forgiveness to the ex-spouse, noting to the Lord in doing so, that yes, I'd done that years ago and repeatedly off and on since.  But I'd not for awhile, and of course, there is no means of loving if one is not forgiving.  Forgiveness bears repeating.  It is only when we forgive, are we forgiven.  We love most when we forgive.  To fully love, one must fully forgive.  

Pain is always connected with forgiveness or there would be no need to forgive; and love, as we realize, is part and parcel to pain.  Love, forgiveness, pain:  ach and all intertwine.  Blessedness comes.

God bless His Real Presence in us!

Catholic Hermit: The Hermit Ponders Sideways Crosses (reprise, June 2008)

[Note:  Retrieved this post from late June, 2008!  I wrote others in that time frame re. the topics of suffering that we bring upon ourselves as opposed to suffering that God allows us to bear.  Of course, pain can teach us much, regardless, but is best if of God's choosing, not our doing.  God wills all good even if we might not see it His way, for those of us who love Him!]

Well, here we have a sideways cross on a purificator. The nothing Catholic hermit asked the confessor to open the sacristy so it could get a small pile of these, so as to re-press them, so as to have the crosses not sideways but right-side-up.

This was following a confession dealing with its compulsions. The compulsions include not only seeing a vision of how something might look but in feeling it--sensing what more is needed and focusing intensely until that vision manifests. Example given: The Mary Gardens here at Agnus Dei and the recent re-investment in more roses for the Our Lady of Fatima Memorial Rose Garden.  The nothing tries again on the roses, thankfully with some discounted lovelies.


Then there was the example of many interests of the past, and of purchasing the supplies such as watercolors for an in-home publishing company of Christian greeting cards and artistic consignment jobs, but the market did not sustain this after a move to another locale. There are still the makings for rosaries, with many Job's Tears seeds waiting to have tiny holes drilled in them. Maybe that will wait until (and if) the hermit is bedridden at some point.

Then there is the matter of these sideways crosses. Nothing noticed them months ago when doing its little sacristan job, one Mass weekly. It then gained permission to take these to the hermitage to right-side-up them. Nothing is rather meticulous about how the altar looks, down to the embroidered crosses on the purificators. Some of the little embroidered crosses are faded, some hand-stitched, some machine-embroidered, some of one style, some of another, and another. But the sideways crosses seem unseemly.

If they were at an angle, that would help for it would remind us of Jesus falling the first, second, third and many more times in the history of our human affronts to His dignity and love.

The confessor opened up the sacristy, turning off the alarm, so nothing could fulfill its small mission. It was a compulsion to upright the sideways, but with a good intention. The confessor had counseled that earlier--that what the nothing was mentioning was not sinful but to be considered based upon the motives. It had good motives in painting Christian cards to sell to help augment low income to rear the children. It had good motives in learning to make rosaries, in acquiring classic Catholic books, in desiring to learn to play the harp (first song hoping to play, "Panis Angelicus"), and even in wanting to correct the sideways crosses. Nothing desires the altar to be beautiful, in loving order, and every tiny detail to the glory of God!

So we searched around for those purificators which nothing had forgotten to take the other evening, as the priest had returned them in one of the several teeny sacristan drawers--the kind of drawers that excite the nothing because they are rather mysterious, aren't they, with all their little labels of this and that of holy ministrations? He did gently suggest that perhaps they would not be able to be righted. But nothing insisted it would be a matter of refolding them correctly and repressing.

Nothing returned to Agnus Dei, and then thought to try refolding one, so the cross would stand up like a respectable, holy cross ought to stand. It didn't work. Instead, the purificator would have to be folded in twice on each side, then folded down in half, making the purificator a squatty, thickened, cumbersome wad.

So nothing began to ponder that in trying to right seeming wrongs, sometimes one must accept them instead, and try out a sample option prior to taking larger steps. Why had it not simply tried to refold one purificator after Mass the other evening, when the desire took fruition to straighten up those sideways crosses?

Another option is to snip the embroidery and re-embroider upright crosses. Well, that is too compulsive for even the nothing. It began to ponder that perhaps nothing isn't so compulsive, after all, for the gardens have this, that, and all kinds of flowers here and there, not in any order or fashion other than what paints a picture somewhat akin to the vision in nothing's inner sight and senses.

Next nothing pondered the good of sideways crosses. Surely there is good in them. While resting the spine to alleviate pain, nothing lay in bed and considered that St. Peter was crucified upside down...but the cross was right side up. St. Andrew was crucified on a cross on an angle, in an "X" shape. How could one be martyred on a sideways cross? Nothing considered that it would take some engineering to do that, and with its own pain, would desire to be hung with the right side of its body, up, and the left hanging down. Yet, that is the body being sideways, not the cross.

These thoughts did offer opportunity to meditate on the suffering of any form of crucifixion, and how people in some time period thought up crucifixion, and built crosses in a certain fashion so as to torture people until they died. A sideways cross would not work, as it would require being suspended on the long-sided end by a chain or rope from...something.

Again, what can be considered with sideways crosses, since they have appeared as a reality in nothing's life? Yes, we do have sideways situations in our lives, in our souls! Of course we do! It is perspective gone awry, from some natural instinct of the vertical and horizontal, and based upon physics as well as physiology as well as what the cross means to humanity, especially followers of Jesus Christ.

Perhaps sideways crosses are those burdens in life that we not only cause from some lack or skew of perspective, but those crosses we bear in a kind of lop-sided, awkward and cumbersome way. They are just not quite right, somehow, and aren't the kind of crosses that allow holy suffering but rather stand out as something brought upon us, by "self", from carelessness, lack of attention to detail, distraction in an effort, or downright confusion.

Sideways crosses, then, could be corrected with extra effort. Or maybe it is best to put them in the bottom of the stack, or to be discarded, for they are not really suitable crosses. They are wrought from our own misconceptions or oversights.

Sideways crosses, for example, could be self-induced sufferings due to not getting our own way, being upset over trivialities and stirring ourselves into upset, feeling the victim when the problem is our own doing, trying to control others and situations that are none of our business, and agonizing over material objects. Yet pondering sideways crosses unfolds new ways of viewing what one (and maybe others) may not recognize as askew...until it is noticed eventually and the simple attempts to upright these sideways crosses become futile.

The best thing to do with sideways crosses it seems, is to notice, assess, and efficiently get rid of them. Perhaps they are to be burned, like dross, in the furnace where our other mistakes incinerate, sooner or later.