The Fourth Floor at St. Mary’s

My friend was released from the hospital yesterday, three weeks after being admitted at death’s door. What an incredible story she has to tell. The fourth floor at St. Mary’s hospital is where many such stories start. When I arrived three weeks ago to sit with the family as they waited, it was my first trip back there in fifteen years. Back then, it was my anxious family waiting, wondering and filled with fear. 

I had just turned 45 and along with the arrival of my birthday, a nagging cough. For several weeks it got steadily worse, until finally I couldn’t sleep. Although, I wanted to wait until the following Monday to make another trip to the doctor, it was Pam who had insisted that I go to the emergency room on a Saturday. It had been that insistence that essentially saved my life. Once admitted, it was discovered that my nagging cough was being caused by a defective mitral valve which had been coming apart for several weeks. Blood was pooling around my heart whenever I laid down...congestive heart failure. 24 hours after being admitted, a surgeon with the bedside manner of an orangutan, was performing open heart surgery.

The details don’t matter, and I would rather not get into them anyway. Suffice it to say that it was a staggering event that had life changing consequences for me. But, as my friend returns home, I’m remembering things that I’d forgotten about when I came home after just a week at St. Mary’s. The primary emotion was a profound disorientation. What the heck had just happened to me? It’s like all of a sudden I had forgotten how normal was supposed to feel. I was grateful to be alive but not quite sure what this new life was going to be like. I felt damaged, the ugly 8 inch scar down my chest the physical manifestation of that damage. My emotions were all over the map. Poor Pam had never, ever seen me cry in our 20 years together, and now suddenly I was a water works. I remember wanting to see people...right up to the minute they arrived, then I counted the minutes until they left. It was such an odd feeling, having visitors. These were people who I loved and who loved me...but I remember feeling strangely embarrassed, wondering how people were seeing me. Did they think I was damaged? 

Then there were the kids from church. Back then I was a teacher of high school students in a very large and active youth group at Grove Avenue Baptist. Ordinarily, our house was full of such kids on the weekends. Now, Pam struggled to manage their visits. I’m told that many of them tried to visit me when I was still in the hospital but Pam had thought that unworkable and unwise. So instead, and I can’t remember if it was her suggestion or one of the kids, someone provided them with a piece of poster board which they all signed with their well wishes. Every time I looked at it, I would get choked up. Finally, I rolled it up and stuck it in my closet. Too many memories. 

But, watching my friend go though a far worse ordeal over these last three weeks, many of those memories have come roaring back. Although she possesses a far greater faith than me, I’m sure that she will experience some of the same disorientation, the same wide ranging emotional swings, the same mental exhaustion.

So, I couldn’t help myself. I found one of the two posters. It feels like a million years ago...

The other one had a big thing in the middle of it that said Braveheart. I remember feeling everything but brave. Terrified? Confused? Rattled? Yes. Brave?? Not a chance. My friend is brave. And everyone who prayed so fervently for her survival must continue praying for her complete recovery.

A Horrible Discovery

I glanced at my calendar today and discovered something truly horrible. Actually, I discovered two bad things, which combined equal one horrible thing. So far 2018 has been a year to forget, filled with one calamity after another, and now...this....April Fools Day falls on a Sunday....not just any old Sunday, but Easter Sunday!!

Words cannot possibly express the depths of my disappointment. The first day of April has provided me with a lifetime of unending thrills. I have pulled off so many epic gags on this glorious day, it is impossible to count them all. My performances throughout the years on this day have made me a first ballot practical joke Hall of Famer. But as bad as this news is for me, it will be a day of great rejoicing for everyone at my office, who no doubt will view this tragic quirk of the calendar as some sort of year of jubilee thing. But, I should have known this would happen in 2018. I mean, everything else has gone wrong...why not?

Some might ask, why does the fact that April Fools Day is on Easter Sunday mean that the day is ruined? See, that’s the sort of rookie question I would expect from people who just don’t understand the significance of April Fools. 

Listen, it would be hard to explain to a coworker how you managed to take apart the headset of their phone to jam a clove of garlic down in the mouthpiece...on the day that our Lord and Savior rose from the dead. Filling several strategically important cabinets with 500 orange ping pong balls, then making sure that it’s Lynwood Atkinson that opens the cabinet first is a great gag...but might seem considerably less funny when it’s discovered that I did all this booby trapping on the same day that our redeemer was crucified. Installing a scramble program that disables the keyboard of someone’s computer might produce a profane outburst which would seem especially egregious the very day after the resurrection. 

So, this year there will be no Vaselined doorknobs, no cling-wrapped toilet seats, no phones hidden above the ceiling tiles. No buckets of ping pong balls will be hanging precariously by a fishing line above anyone’s office door. No one’s family pictures will be hanging from the ceiling by duct tape. There will be no fake summons, no phony arrest warrants, no inflated telephone bills, open cans of sardine cat food will not be hidden beneath anyone’s car seat. All because the Stone was rolled away.

Two days later, I’ll turn 60. 

I’m telling you...2018 stinks.

A Baby Shower and a Miracle

All week my wife has been burning the midnight oil, preparing and planning a baby shower. I know nothing of such things, having never attended a baby shower. It is quite an involved process which includes but is by no means limited to...a nursery rhyme game, wisdom cards, assorted teas, something called cucumber canapés, and of course, Pam’s famous designer cupcakes. I’m sure it will be a glorious affair, since nothing that my wife has a hand in could possibly be anything but.

The beneficiary of this shower is Lacey Fort. It will be Lacey’s first child. Unfortunately, Lacey’s mother-in-law will not be able to make it in person, but she will be Skyped in to the proceedings. See, Lacey’s mother-in-law has been in the hospital for the past seventeen days fighting for her life, fighting and winning, I should say. Against a mountain of odds, she has astonished us all with a miraculous recovery from a series of dangerous operations. She has done so with all of her trademark humor, tenacity and faith firmly in tact. Her husband sent me a text a couple of days ago with a picture of her scooting around with the aid of a walker. Knowing everything she had endured in such a short period of time, the picture took my breath away. Yesterday Pam received a text from her. It was full of encouragement...for us, along with gratitude for our friendship. Again, a miracle.

So, tomorrow she will attend the shower via technology. Her presence there will be a testament to many praiseworthy things...

1. The incredible skill and tenacity of gifted surgeons.

2. The tender and practiced care of a team of dedicated, compassionate nurses.

3. The love and devotion of her husband.

4. The steadfast affection and loyalty of her children.

5. The selfless devotion of so many of her friends, but in particular, one Kim Davis.

But, it was not only these things. In this particular case, despite the skill and proficiency of the doctors and nurses, there was something else. There were several times early on when the doctors prepared for the worst, their abilities finding themselves up against long and seemingly insurmountable odds. Indeed, her prognosis seemed to shift between grave and hopeless. Her astonishing recovery has all of them baffled, and all of us amazed and humbled. I don’t know enough about the biology and science involved, but those who do can’t fully account for her recovery. Here’s what I do know.

This is a missionary family, a tribe of multigenerational preachers, teachers and doctors who have followed the call of God to serve in Africa and elsewhere. Consequently, the Fort family is known and loved by groups of people literally all over the world, in every time zone, on every continent. When news of her sudden illness began to spread across that world, suddenly, word began to trickle back to Richmond of groups large and small gathering to pray. A pastor in South Korea, a church in Africa, congregations all over America, friends in China. The relentless, fervent prayers of thousands of people went up on her behalf simultaneously in every corner of the world. 

Just as I don’t understand the biology and science, I must also confess that neither do I fully understand the ways of God. I have no explanation for why he chooses to heal some but not others. To say that he is sovereign and is free to do as he wishes will not satisfy the atheist, nor frankly does it satisfy me. Yes, there is science involved here. But the God who created the science, sometimes inexplicably overrules the science. In this case, I believe he did just that. 

So, tomorrow everyone will celebrate the pending arrival of a new and precious life, along with the miraculous preservation of another.

I stand amazed...

Minor Prophet Zingers

Day 67 of Reading Through the Bible in 90 Days lands me in the midst of the minor prophets, which is kind of like an off, off, off, way off Broadway play in the Catskills which a handful of people watch while trying to choke down really dry chicken cordon blue. It’s a lot of the same thing, repeated over and over again...Israel is an unfaithful brood of covenant breaking ingrates and their comeuppance is close at hand. But, as I have discovered at least a dozen times during this exercise, even in the dullest, driest parts of scripture, one skims at their own peril, because if you do, you’re likely to miss this:

Though the fig tree does not bud
    and there are no grapes on the vines,
though the olive crop fails
    and the fields produce no food,
though there are no sheep in the pen
    and no cattle in the stalls,
18 yet I will rejoice in the Lord,    I will be joyful in God my Savior.

Habakkuk 3:17-18

Would I really..rejoice and be joyful...if I lost everything? I very much doubt it. So, the conclusion is that maybe my faith in God is basically a transactional relationship...he blesses me with abundance, and I believe and have faith in him. I know it’s not that simple, but the whole Job thing has always given me pause. And now the same idea gets thrown at me by this Habakkuk guy. 

So, I ponder all of this and it occurs to me that when Pam and I were young parents and she had just made the decision to be a stay at home Mom, we were as broke and unstable financially as we have ever been...and yet, I’m not sure that we have ever been as close to God as we were during that time. During a season when every month was a struggle to pay the bills, every week a balancing act, our faith was real and sustaining. 

Maybe what makes this passage from Habakkuk sound so impossible is imagining what it would be like now to lose it all, after a couple decades of plenty? Maybe if you don’t have much to lose having consistent, passionate faith is easier. Maybe this is why you don’t see a lot of religious-themed bumper stickers on Maseratis.

The lesson here? Don’t throw shade on the minor prophets!

A Bird’s Song

I’m told that we are only two weeks away from the arrival of Spring. I’m also told that it is always darkest before the dawn. These two rumors seem connected. Glancing at my weather app this morning, I see two snowflakes beside this coming Sunday and Monday. My heart sinks.

It is fair to say that I hate Winter. It has not always been so. When I was a younger man, I loved it, the more snow the better. Now, it is something to be endured. February, always my least favorite month of the year, was terrible this year. It seemed like every day was either cloudy or raining. Now, the whole world is damp and chilly. Shriveled brown leaves cling to the oak trees in my yard. Sticks and pine cones are scattered everywhere from the recent winds. And now...snow’s coming.

Winter is a time devoted almost exclusively to my professional obligations. After 36 years I have developed a routine that front loads most of my client meetings into the first five months of the year. This intentional scheduling allows me the flexibility to travel during the summer months, before ramping up again during the Fall. So, March 7th finds me half way through the busiest, most hectic part of my year. It’s a good thing too since there is literally nothing else to do which involves venturing outside. Dismal low clouds, 40 degrees and misty rain conspire against outdoor pursuits.

But, this morning there is one bird in my backyard who hasn’t gotten the memo. Despite all the dreariness, this guy is perched on a limb singing his heart out, the brightest, happiest little warble you’ve ever heard. No other bird replies, his is a solo performance. Still, he persists with enthusiasm. It’s as if he knows something that nobody else knows. Pam says it’s a Carolina Wren. The more he sings, the more I think perhaps he is a she. Optimism, I have found, is most often a feminine quality.

Regardless, a bird has given me encouragement this day.

Would that we all had such a song in our hearts...

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&cd=21&ved=0ahUKEwjn24v8mtrZAhXBwFMKHdp6C6QQt9IBCFowFA&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3D7GLIFUtXj2M&usg=AOvVaw2S-iAh-z4T13Zzkw-0egah

Bob’s Apples

Once upon a time there was a man named Bob who owned an apple orchard. The apples grown in Bob’s orchard were delicious and plentiful. Each year when they were ripe he would take them into town and sell them at the farmer’s market, and each year the people bought all of them, since they were delicious. Year after year this happy tradition repeated itself, Bob grew his apples, harvested them, transported them into town and sold them to his eager customers.

Over the course of time, Bob realized that the people really loved his apples. Furthermore, he was the only apple seller in town. It occurred to him that he could raise the price of his apples and his customers would pay the higher price because A. Bob’s apples were delicious and B. His were the only apples in town. So every couple of years Bob would raise the price of his apples and every price increase was tolerated without complaint by his customers.

Then, one year when he was unloading his truck full of apples at the farmer’s market Bob noticed to his great surprise that there were two other apple stands at the market, filled to the brim with fresh, ripe apples. Moreover, the prices charged by these two new apple sellers were considerably lower than his. But, since he had so many faithful customers who loved his apples, he offered them at the same price as before. When the customers arrived at the farmer’s market, many of them refused to even consider buying apples from these two new apple vendors. But before long, a handful of them wandered over to the new stands and tried the free samples they were offering. They discovered that the new apples were also delicious, not only every bit as delicious as Bob’s apples but 25% less expensive. Suddenly, Bob experienced a 25% decline in sales and revenue. Bob drove back to his farm and considered this new reality.

He spent much time in thought over the winter. What was he to do? His first thought was that he would have to lower his prices. But, he quite enjoyed the lifestyle that his higher prices had afforded him through the years. Then, he considered repackaging his apples to make them more appealing. Maybe he could bake some of them into pies and pastries, or make sauce and cider out of some of them. But, that would require a lot of extra work. The more he thought about his new rivals, the angrier he became. He did some research and discovered that these two new apple merchants weren’t even from the area. In fact, nobody had ever heard of them. Turns out, they were from a neighboring county. It was upon this discovery that Bob hit upon a strategy for dealing with this new, unwelcome competition. 

Bob drove into the county seat and paid a visit to his local magistrate, who happened to be his brother-in-law. Bob explained the situation in detail and presented a plan of action...These guys don’t even live around here. They can’t even vote for you in your next election. And yet, here they are, undercutting me and reducing my profits, and I can and will be voting in your next election. The local magistrate quickly discerned the logic in Bob’s argument, but raised a potential objection...Bob, I see your point, and I am very grateful for all you do for my campaign, but if I punish your competitors, it will benefit you but it will also raise the cost of apples for all my other constituents. Bob looked at his brother-in-law and smiled...True, but last year I gave your reelection campaign a large donation without which your reelection probably wouldn’t have happened. The way I see it, the least you can do is return the favor. Pass a law that requires a 25% fee for all out of state apples sold at the farmer’s market...problem solved.

Within five years, Bob’s competitors had disappeared, his orchard had been decimated by a worm infestation, the farmer’s market had been shut down for code violations, and the price of apples had quadrupled because of acute shortages. But, Bob’s brother-in-law was now governor of the state and had passed a law which guaranteed Bob an Apple price subsidy which paid him not to grow anymore apples.

And this, boys and girls, is the story of tariffs.

The Hex Continues

Last September, Pam and I spent three idyllic weeks in a cottage on Quantabacook Lake in Maine. It was as if we had found the perfect lake house on the perfect lake in our favorite place in the world...midcoast Maine, USA. But then, we came home, and ever since we opened the door to our house in Short Pump, our lives have taken on the characteristics of something approaching demon possession. I’m not one who normally goes in for such things, but the word hex has made an appearance in my vocabulary. The last six months has visited upon us a series of Keystone Cop-style misfortune. Consider...

# An exploding dish washer

# A brand new coffee maker who’s maiden pot featured burning internal electronics

# A week long stay in a hotel which featured a door to nowhere through which poured freezing air 24/7

# A hole in my library wall, put there by piano movers, which took nearly a month to repair

# A failed washing machine which was replaced with a new washing machine which seems incapable of...washing clothes

So, I came up with an idea. My wife and I need to get away. I know what I’ll do. I’ll schedule a couple of annual reviews with my Myrtle Beach clients, and take Pam with me. We can make a long weekend of it. We’ll have a chance to disconnect from our suddenly dysfunctional Short Pump life and bask in the easy pace of the beach. It will be therapeutic, I reasoned. An opportunity to recharge our batteries, I thought. And, I was absolutely right. Right up until the instant yesterday afternoon...when it wasn’t.

Pam gets an email informing her that the lovely $1300 Apple computer she just purchased at the Lynnhaven Mall in Virginia Beach is ready for pick up! In addition to this surprising news, Pam is informed in a rapid-fire series of emails that she has now established accounts with over a hundred stores selling all sorts of cool stuff from Kalamazoo to Kuala Lumpur. These emails came in standard English, but also German, Arabic, Spanish, French, and because identity theft is nothing if not inclusive, Vulcan. 

The next three hours featured my harassed and harangued wife making frantic calls to banks, credit card companies, and internet providers, one such call placed her on hold for over an hour. A police report was filed. Tears were shed. There was no therapy, no basking, no beach. Our daily bible reading from Ezekiel has offered not one verse of help!

By 7:00 last night, she was exhausted and exasperated...and all of us were hungry. We decided that it was probably too late to get a reservation at a nice place, and since we didn’  feel very nice, this was probably a good thing. So, we decided to go low brow, and throw all pretensions of our diet out the window. Right up the street is a local establishment that practically screamed the word Dive!! The name alone was an advertisement...Duffy’s Seafood Shack. Just in case we needed a reminder of exactly what kind of establishment we had just entered, this sign on the ladies bathroom door helped clarify...

The menu was slightly oily and featured all of the artery clogging standards of low country cooking, but their description of shrimp and grits caught my attention by stating that this particular dish was, mentioned in the New York Times!! Granted, it didn’t say what exactly it was mentioned for...cholera? Projectile vomiting? Nevertheless, I took a chance. Despite my recent run of bad luck, despite the very real possibility that I might be under a hex of biblical proportions, I figured that my chances of becoming violently ill from an entree served up at a restaurant that brags of it’s world famous deep fried corn on the cob, were less than 30%.

Best shrimp and grits EVER.

This morning, my stomach feels calm. It’s sunny outside. The wind has died down, and my daughter is in route. What can possibly go wrong?

Stay tuned.