angels seen and unseen

ian slipped and fell from the top of the high dive ladder at our city pool friday night. he landed, basically, on his face on the concrete below. his chin took the brunt of the fall. split wide and deep, it required ten stitches on the inside and ten stitches outside. his body has abrasions everywhere. the interior of his mouth is black and blue; it's amazing that he lost no teeth. x-rays confirmed there were no broken bones and no internal injuries.

the real miracle, however, is how lucky we are.

occasionally, my mind drifts to what could have been ~ how he could have fallen backwards instead.

i have prayed to god non-stop over the past 36 hours.

how do i sufficiently thank him for protecting ian? i still have this child, who i love more than my own life ~ multiple thank you's to christ just don't seem like they're enough.

lying in bed this morning, watching ian sleep, it dawned on me...god truly KNOWS the depth of my love for my son. his love for his own child, whom he sacrificed, was no different. so perhaps, as i ineptly and repeatedly tell HIM how thankful i am for protecting ian, he completely understands the depth of my gratitude as well.

i have no doubts that there were unseen angels surrounding ian as he fell friday night. but there were other angels there as well.

julie showed up at the pool, rather unexpectedly, a mere five minutes before the fall. to say that she was a godsend would be an understatement. she was there in the car, craddling a very bloody little boy, as i frantically drove us to urgent care. she was at the hospital the entire time; she called the prayer team; she woke up early the next morning just to bring an x-box to ian; she brought us dinner last night. she has been a rock. her love for my children has never been more evident.

jill took care of kate, which was wonderful. we didn't have to worry at all about her. she was with her loving aunt.

we have to thank tony and juli shutts as well. even though i'm sure they will never read this blog, their help was so much appreciated.

our ambulance staff and ER workers at adena were fantastic. i couldn't have asked for more compassionate care.

for all of the members of the prayer team who were praying for ian ~ thank you ~ to phyllis and wendy and big jim and pauline ~ thank you ~ to my dear friend peggy who has called repeatedly to check on ian and has offered to come down and check his teeth ~ thank you.

takaji (dr. k.), i'm not sure how we can adequately thank you for taking personal time out of the office to care for our family. we really love you for that.

god has been so good to us.

we praise him for his mercy.

psalm 145

in praise and thanksgiving to God for sending His angels to protect ian last night. i am so unworthy of His goodness, but stand in awe of His compassion!!!

I lift you high in praise, my God, O my King!
and I'll bless your name into eternity.
God is magnificent;
he can never be praised enough.
There are no boundaries to his greatness.
Generation after generation stands in awe of your work;
each one tells stories of your mighty acts.
God is all mercy and grace -
not quick to anger, is rich in love.
God is good to one and all;
everything he does is suffused with grace.
Creation and creatures applaud you, God;
your holy people bless you.
God always does what he says,
and is gracious in everything he does.
All eyes are on you, expectant;
Everything God does is right -
the trademark on all his works is love.
God's there, listening for all who pray,
for all who pray and mean it.
My mouth is filled with God's praise.
Let everything living bless him,
bless his holy name from now to eternity!
(-The Message)

sesame street generation

i love you tube. at times when i'm feeling nostalgic, or longing for my youth, i watch classic sesame street clips there. julie, jill, and i were products of sesame street. we watched it in the morning, at noon during lunch, and again in the afternoon. i think i appreciate the humor and wisdom of it more now as an adult, though.

i loved anytime john-john (above) was on the show. this rapunzel skit from the fourth sesaon is also one of my favorites (rapunzel with a brooklyn accent ~ hysterical):



here's poor grover, of course, as the incompetent waiter (also from the fourth season):



and do any of you remember "mahna mahna"? for years, i thought he was saying "phenomenon".



jim henson was a genius, wouldn't you agree? talk about a man who used his gifts to make the world a better place. wow.

oh, and by the way, did you realize that there is a wikipedia for muppets? seriously, it's called Muppet Wiki. if you're in to sesame street or the muppet show, it's kinda cool.

enjoy the videos.

birches

recently, while digging around in my attic, i found a copy of the norton anthology of literature, which i used in a college english class almost 21 years ago. upon re-reading some of the poetry pieces, i discovered "birches" by robert frost. i have fallen in love with it...particularly these last lines:

So was I once myself a swinger of birches
And so I dream of going back to be.
It's when I'm weary of considerations,
And life is too much like a pathless wood.
Where your face burns and tickles with the cobwebs
Broken across it, and one eye is weeping
From a twig's having lashed across it open.
I'd like to get away from earth awhile
And then come back to it and begin over.
May no fate willfully misunderstand me
And half grant what I wish and snatch me away
Not to return.
Earth's the right place for love:
I don't know where it's likely to go better.
I'd like to go by climbing a birch tree,
And climb black branches up a snow-white trunk
Toward heaven, till the tree could bear no more,
But dipped its top and set me down again.
That would be good both going and coming back.
One could do worse than be a swinger of birches.

i've never climbed a birch tree, but as a child, i often climbed the apple tree in my grandmother's back yard. life was uncomplicated then. and pure. and joyous. oh, to be in that tree again, surrounded by simplicity and love.

when i'm weary of considerations and life is too much like a pathless wood, i'd like to get away from earth awhile, and then come back to it and begin over...

eight things about me

tersie challenged some of us on her blog to share eight things about ourselves. in other words, i was one of the persons that she "tagged". so, here's my list ~ and i've tried to come up with some items that i've never discussed on my blog before...

1. i hate traveling long distances in a car. and by "long distances", i mean anything over a couple of hours. it's toooooo claustrophobic for me. i break out in a cold sweat just thinking about it. traveling by plane is okay, though. no problems there.

2. always having a list of things to do is very comforting to me. (see these past blogs for more insight and information.) i don't always get everything done, but that's usually okay.

3. i think that god's most perfect food can be found at crispie creme donuts in chillicothe: the round chocolate doughnut with chocolate icing on top and creme in the middle. i buy them only once or twice a year. and yep, i know they're bad for me, but i don't care. i consider them a small slice of heaven.

4. i love a good nap. this may seem like it gets in the way of #2, but it really doesn't. i don't get to take naps very often, but when i do...mmmmmmm.

5. lilacs are the best-smelling thing on earth. period.

6. with apologies to any men who might read this...i would rather visit my gynecologist than my dentist, anytime. shots in my mouth ~ good grief. at least at my yearly gyno appt., it's pretty much wham-bam with the speculum and you're good to go for another year. :)

7. i do the columbus dispatch sunday crossword puzzle and cryptoquip every weekend.

8. being crafty helps make my world go 'round. especially stamping. i've thanked God on more than one occasion that i have a hobby that i love.

okay, i now "tag" anyone else who reads this post...

three brothers (out of five)

at the reds game on july 3. guess which one belongs to me!?

family dysfunction

so, i'm coming off a full week of spending time with my in-laws: mother in-law (martha), father in-law (stacy), two brothers in-law, their wives (one pregnant), and three nieces and nephews. they're sweet and all...but gillens 24/7 can become tedious! some random thoughts...

martha and stacy had difficult childhoods. both felt the need, for some reason, to open up to me at different times during the past week and talk to me about their lives. martha's mother died of lung cancer when she was 16. by the age of 19, she had become pregnant (out of wedlock ~ a HUGE catholic no-no) and was promptly disowned and kicked out of her house. within the next ten years, she had five boys. i asked her how on earth she did it...and her response was, "i think ignorance was just bliss."

stacy's father had migrated from ireland as a boy and settled in watertown, new york. irish catholic = big drinkers. his father was a hard-working, strict catholic, who was also an alcoholic. a gentle, loving, dear man, who never touched his children, and would not allow fighting among his sons...but was known to absolutely pound any man who insulted his virtue.

stacy's mother was simply not nice. whether or not his father drank to survive the marriage is unknown. stacy told me a story about his father coming home after drinking one night, and his mother had locked him out. his father picked up a chair on the porch, threw it through the front window, climbed into the house, unlocked the door...climbed back out through the window, opened the front door, walked into the house, and told his wife very calmly to never do that again.

when stacy was 12, his father (vincent) moved out of the house and took his sons with him. his mother and father never divorced (another big catholic no-no), but maintained separate residences until vincent's passing almost twenty years later.

you know, one thing that i think all of us has in common is that we come from families that are ripe with dysfunction. i mean, seriously. do you truly know of a NORMAL family? it doesn't exist. we are all faulty and diseased and waist-deep in muck...every one of us. think about your family and the relationships that exist, or DON'T exist, within it. it's messy, isn't it? in reality, wouldn't a NORMAL family be defined as one that has undergone tremendous obstacles, but for some reason, love continues to prevail.

so here's to my mother and father in-law, who can sometimes drive me a little crazy. but heck, they've been through different types of hell and have come out on the other side.

and i'd say, that's some kind of miracle.

with apologies to all my apple friends

sorry, but i thought this cartoon was pretty funny!!!