Waiting Games.

There are many waiting games we play throughout our lives.
We wait to be born.
We wait to begin school.
Go off to High School or University.

Wait to wed. Or not. Usually wait to meet Mr or Ms Compatible.
Wait for our child/ren to be born.
Wait for them to begin school.
Leave school.
Begin careers.

Marry.
Part.
Marry again.
Or repartner.

They begin their 'cycles of heaven', for want of a better phrase.
The older generation continues to wait.
For Grandchildren. If we are very lucky.

For Birthdays, Christmas. Holidays. Family Celebrations.

Then there are the agony waits. A child is ill, hospitalised.
We wait with terror, for the verdict, telling us it will all be ok.
For some, it will not be ok.

We wait for the grief, & the anger to pass.
We wait to try to heal.

A parent is ill. Dying in fact. Though that is terribly hard to face initially.
When the final realisation comes, it is a nurse who gently tells.
Were the Doctors cowards? Uncaring? Disinterested?
It looked a lot like that from where we stood.

That was our perception, as our loved one lay dying in a grubby, shabby, 'treatment room'.
Devoid of windows. Full of leftover equipment, broken or useless.
Full of detritus of ward life.
It felt to us, like a final insult at the end of a good, caring & loving life.

Now we are so fearful again.
Son in law is in hospital.
In such fierce pain, he is on a morphine drip.

He helped us yesterday, to move furniture.
He was in a great deal of pain then.
He didn't want to let us down.
Now he is undergoing all sorts of tests to try to determine what is wrong with him.

Tests have ruled some things out.
More tests are yest to determine the cause of his pain.

We are waiting at home. Waiting to hear the next step.
Our Daughter J, is waiting by his side.

I want to tell his parents.
If that was my child, I would be furious if I wasn't told.

He is adamant he doesn't want them told.
They are not as close a family as we are... but,
My Mother's heart quakes in fear.


**********



Quote from The Prophet, Kalil Gibran.


"And a woman who held a babe against her bosom said,
Speak to us of Children.
And he said:
Your children are not your children.
They are the sons & daughters of Life's longing for itself.
The come through you but not from you,
And though they are with you yet they belong not to you.

You may give them your love but not your thoughts.
For they have their own thoughts.
You may house their bodies but not their souls,
For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow,
which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams.
You may strive to be like them, but seek not to make them like you.
For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday.

You are the bows from which your children as
living arrows are sent forth.
The Archer sees the mark upon the path of the
infinite, and He bends you with His might that His
arrows may go swift & far.
Let your bending in the Archer's hand be for gladness;
For even as he loves the arrow that flies, so He
loves also the bow that is stable."

As you all know, if you read these posts, I have no "Religion". But I love the words of wisdom in this little book. It just seems like such common sense.
Of course we don't own our chilren. Of course they should not be like us.
But I feel we have the right to love & cherish them.


Mozart, Anything at all!