“It’s so hard to forget pain, but it’s even harder to remember sweetness. We have no scar to show for happiness. We learn so little from peace.” ~ Chuck Palahniuk, Diary
Through the grace of God, we seemingly have survived the worst of G’s teen years. It was not that long ago that I was on the verge of a mental collapse. Coming out of that stormy phase, I feel like a survivor. I actually see some sun in my life and in her life, and the dark clouds that hung over us are becoming thinner and thinner.
I now have time to focus on the little things in life, such as challenging my newly found skill of keeping plants alive.
These plants are what I have to show to reflect this peaceful period of my life. I have no relationship to stress over, no immediate financial or health concerns, G is improving daily – in essence, everything for which I prayed to God, He gave to me. My plants are a reflection of my current state: growth and serenity. I wonder now if my plants never survived before because my energy was troubled, dark, and dismal. Did my plants absorb the toxic beams that I emitted? I believe so.
“I thank the universe for taking everything it has taken and giving to me everything it is giving. Balance.” ~ Rupi Kaur, Milk and Honey
I have had a series of good fortune lately.
So accustomed to rejection, disappointment, and losing, I cannot help but wonder if all the good things that I have been experiencing lately have been because I have been going to church every Sunday and praying to God regularly.
Is God finally answering my prayers? In my heart, I know it is. I feel it in the very essence of my soul.
Miracle No. 1: My friend went into cardiac arrest last June. Her heart stopped for four minutes. The doctors were able to revive her heart, but she fell into a coma. She was “asleep” for weeks. The doctors told her parents to expect that she would likely be brain dead or severely brain damaged due to the lack of oxygen to her brain while her heart had stopped, if she even was able to wake up. They were prepared for the worst. After a few weeks, the doctors asked her parents if they would consider taking her off life support. They said no – absolutely not.
We all prayed, day and night, for a miracle.
After what seemed like an eternity, she woke up. Not only did she wake up, but her full brain functionality was intact. Her recovery will be long, but she is able to talk and think and write. She has a hole in her neck from where the respirator was for the weeks she was in a coma, but she is home now. Her case is a true miracle that has stunned all the doctors. Only God could have saved her, and He did.
Miracle No. 2: Everyone knows that the real estate rental market here in NYC is brutally expensive. During the pandemic, I was fortunate enough to secure a deal in a luxury apartment building with sweeping views of the East River. My lease was due to run out this summer, a busy and expensive time for any rental market. Many of my friends in the building have already moved out due to the egregioius increase in the rent. We are not in a rent stabilized building, so rent increases are not capped. Some have said their renewal offers were as high as $800.00 a month increase.
I had been bracing myself for a potential move. I prayed to God that the renewal terms would be for an amount that I could afford. Since my lease is due to expire at the end of July, I knew that my renewal offer was coming soon. I received the email yesterday.
I palmed my chest as I opened the email, as if to protect my heart from the bad news I was expecting. As I read through the email outlining the renewal terms, I was shocked to discover that not only did they offer a lower rent amount, they offered me a two year renewal term.
How is this even possible? This kind of renewal offer is unheard of in New York, and especially now when the market has reached historic highs. I am still reeling at my good fortune. I told a few close friends, and they are in disbelief. “Through Him all things are possible.”
I told another close friend that I felt as though God had finally heard and granted my prayers. She knows that I have been going to church regularly and of how I have come a long way with my relationship with God. So it hurt when her response was, “It’s not God, it’s something else, but it’s not God.”
Her husband passed away from cancer nearly three years ago, so I understand why she is angry with God. I was angry with God myself when my sister passed away from cancer, but I never tried to diminish someone else’s belief towards God. Last summer, I saw that she was wearing a crucifix around her neck, and I had commented that I was glad she was returning to God. She said she was not and that she was wearing it simply for fashion purposes. I was a bit angry at that, but did not say anything. I was angry that she was making light of Jesus’ sacrifice and of the faith and devotion of those who believe.
I know that everyone’s personal relationship with God is personal, and I respect her beliefs (or lack thereof), but I felt that her comment to me yesterday about my recent good fortune not being attributable to God was unsupportive of my belief, and out of line.
In the meantime, my heart is filled with extreme gratitude to God and no one can persuade me to feel otherwise.
I know that it looks as though I failed in my goal to express gratitude daily. However, I did express gratitude, but due to certain circumstances, I was not able to get online and post on a daily basis. However, I keep a book journal, and so I was able to pen my gratitude the old-fashioned way.
It was difficult to find the time to post as I was in the Philippines for over a month. I left on February 24 and came back on March 25. It was a low-key “working vacation” and I kept NYC hours (Philippines was thirteen hours ahead, but then changed to twelve hours when Daylight Savings Time came into effect while I was overseas) and I slept in three-four hour increments while I juggled staying awake at night to work and managing to spend time with my family during the day.
We stayed local and enjoyed nearby towns, sampled food specialties from different provinces, enjoyed the luscious terrains, and caught breathtaking sunsets.
We came back to New York, just in time to catch the cherry blossoms. Our neighborhood is one of the few places in the city where we have front row seats to their magnificence.
I have often felt deprived in certain parts of my life: in love, in wealth, and general good fortune. The one constant blessing and gift that I have had is the fact that I indisputably have the best of friends.
Day 5: I have been, am now, and forever will be, grateful for my circle of friends. The circle is eclectic and diverse, filled with strong ass women and the most gentle and protective of men.
Most of my friendships have withstood the tests of time, distance, and circumstances. And the newer friendships I have made, I have been fortunate to have met people who genuinely have good hearts, people who have shown me that true friendship does not require a history, and they have shown that people can truly care about you even after knowing you for a short period of time.
Last year G was cutting herself. The skin on her arms had become red and raised from the constant trauma she inflicted on her own flesh. It hurt me to look at them because it was a blatant indication of how much she was suffering inside. I had asked her why she cut herself and she said it was to dull the internal pain she was feeling. The physical pain of the flesh made it easier to bear the pain of her mind and soul.
Day 4: I am grateful for the healing process G is experiencing, both inside and out. The skin on her arms is no longer raw. The scars are still clearly there, but her skin has smoothed out. At the beginning of her healing journey, she wore a lot of long-sleeved shirts. She said she felt embarrassed of her arms since the scars were so telling of how they came to exist. She now wears regular shirts and even tank tops. She does not flash her scars, but she does not go to lengths to hide them either. She says that the scars are now a part of who she is, and she has expressed a few times of how she feels proud of what she has overcome.
I am not naive, however, and am fully aware of the steps forward and the steps backward in the healing process. Some days are better than others, but the bad days remarkably have become less and less.
“Sometimes the most remarkable things seem commonplace. I mean when you think about it jet travel is pretty freaking remarkable. You get in a plane it defies the gravity of a entire planet by exploiting a loophole with air pressure and it flies across distances that would take months or years to cross by any means of travel that has been significant for more than a century or three. You hurtle above the earth at enough speed to kill you instantly should you bump into something and you can only breathe because someone built you a really good tin can that seems tight enough to hold in a decent amount of air. Hundreds of millions of man-hours of work and struggle and research blood sweat tears and lives have gone into the history of air travel and it has totally revolutionized the face of our planet and societies.
But get on any flight in the country and I absolutely promise you that you will find someone who in the face of all that incredible achievement will be willing to complain about the drinks.” ~ Jim Butcher, Summer Knight
Day 3: I am grateful that air travel was invented. I am able to travel at least twice a year to see my family in the Philippines. I am grateful that I can fly to nearly everywhere on Earth. I am grateful for all the air travel that I have been privileged to take, and I look forward to discovering more places in the future.
“Everyone must leave something behind when he dies, my grandfather said. A child or a book or a painting or a house or a wall built or a pair of shoes made. Or a garden planted. Something your hand touched some way so your soul has somewhere to go when you die, and when people look at that tree or that flower you planted, you’re there.
It doesn’t matter what you do, he said, so long as you change something from the way it was before you touched it into something that’s like you after you take your hands away. The difference between the man who just cuts lawns and a real gardener is in the touching, he said. The lawn-cutter might just as well not have been there at all; the gardener will be there a lifetime.” ~ Ray Bradbury, Fahrenheit 451
Day 2: I am grateful for a newly acquired skill of being able to keep plants alive. A former certified plant-killer, I am reformed and have now successfully kept four plants alive for nearly a year. For those with green thumbs, this probably makes you laugh, but for me, this is a major accomplishment. Every day, I wake up and check on my plant babies. I turn their pots around daily so that a different part of their leaves gets sunlight.
“The season of Lent is the time for us to take a journey; an inward journey. The season of Lent is as the prophet Joel writes, “a time for us to rend our hearts and not our clothing.” It is a time for self-examination; a time to get to know ourselves a little better. Often times for Lent people will give up a favorite food, or some other form of self-sacrifice. These things are all well and good IF they come from the heart, IF they are a true attempt to re-connect with the Spirit inside us. Otherwise, we are simply “rending” our clothes.” ~ Rev. R.J. Hronek, 47 Days: A Lenten Devotional and Journaling Guide
This year I decided that I am not going to give up anything, but rather, I am going to attempt to do something challenging, something enduring, for forty days.
My challenge this Lent Season is to write down one thing each day for which I am grateful.
Day 1: Today, I am grateful for my job. I had my annual review earlier today, and I found out today that I am valued by my firm. It felt lovely to be praised and acknowledged by the people with whom I spend so many days of my life.
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