Tired but Peaceful

As I type this, there is a nice sunbeam coming in the window here in our room in ICU and I'm getting a bit sleepy and Chris is resting well. We've been waiting for someone to take us up to his new room back on the 11th floor for a couple of hours now. Chris is doing well and doctors are saying going home by Thursday is likely. I never again want to hear from a surgeon, "sign here so I can operate, we're in danger of this being life threatening." I signed, he had surgery and you would never know it today. Seven total strangers took a good thirty minutes to give blood some time in the last month and I can't thank them personally but I'm eternally grateful. Surgeons were able to correct a bleed because these seven people gave them the room to work with Chris' body. And one of the best best friends in the world kept me praying and having faith throughout it.

Seven people cared about Chris without even knowing they WERE caring about Chris. A surgeon filling in for ours, one we had never met, came in and said he couldn't sleep for worrying about Chris. A liver surgeon got up early on his day off to come in and be in the operating room just because he cares about Chris. And this wife got hugs from surgeons and nurses. I didn't wait at Swedish this time he was in surgery. I lit a candle in the chapel at Seattle U. I traced my fingers along the wax wall in that chapel and felt once again the Presence that is surrounding our lives.

Today I am filled with gratitude for compassion and caring by strangers and best friends alike and a keen awareness that human beings really ARE good at heart and really ARE made in the image of God. Colleagues who sit and wait, who offer meals, nurses who give iv's and hugs, surgeons who really get that it isn't just a job but an operation on your family member and that you are scared. And the grace of total strangers who took thirty minutes to keep someone alive amazes me now even though I have never realized it when I gave blood myself.

The hymn that is playing in my heart and head today is One Bread One Body. All I can think about is that line in it..."and we though many throughout the earth, we are one body in this one Lord."

So thanks to all of you, the ones we know really well, the ones we have met and know professionally, the ones we will never meet. I'm glad each of you is our life.

Grace for your journey,
Leigh