Yesterday evening I saw on the kitchen counter a prickly pear cactus fruit that our son Danny had cut in half to look at. (He and Hannah had flown down here from South Dakota Wednesday with SIM President Keith Lavery.) We understood these fruits were edible, and he was eager to check it out while on a morning walk.
Now here it was on the counter, and I was not interested, despite trying tart wood sorrel and raw yucca in South Dakota. Prickly pear cactus fruit just wasn't for me right now, especially when I came home having spent hours sick to my stomach at the clinic after some tough treatments and taking new anti-parasite meds at not quite the right time with food.
Maybe that is why I wasn't thinking straight when I picked up the cactus fruit. I forgot that even the fruit has prickles on it, and suddenly my fingers felt like I'd been stung by a bee!
All day (except for a moment in the restroom), sick and all, I had been a big girl at the clinic.
Even when Mr. Exercise Man (that's what I call him) had me doing some exercises I wasn't used to, and my legs were quivering and I was almost in tears.
But me in tears in front of Mr. Exercise Man? Not on your life!
I had been told by my nurse one day this week that I had "taken it like a champ" when he had to pull out the large port needle he'd already stuck me with because it was misplaced by about one-eighth of an inch, and then had to stick me a second time and push hard to get it to go in. The titanium backside of the port keeps the needle from going through into your chest, but the push on a very fresh and tender port surgical site had me literally nearly passed out with pain.
"Like a champ!" he had said.
Yes sirree!
I must have been a champ.
I had handled even chemo with grace and glory, even when Jonathan and the husband of the lady next to me had been told they couldn't be in the IV room anymore. A new machine for another kind of treatment was being used that day, and the room was too small for all the nurses, patients and caregivers. So the caregivers had to go--and this was the day of my first chemo!
I had expected to have Jonathan beside me to hold my hand, but that went to the wind (and besides, my hands were in or on ice mitts the whole time). But I had reminded myself that I was a big girl, and and the nurses told me how strong I was.
Yes sirree!
I could do this chemo thing on my own, without holding someone's hand.
But when a couple dozen prickly pear prickers exactly 1/4 inch long stuck in my finger, this big, brave warrior crumpled into a whimpering mess.
I was pleading with Jesus as much over the cactus prickers as I ever had with chemo. I tend to carry heavy things with more strength than the little pin pricks.
It reminded me of the statues just down Avenue of the Fountains near here--a cowboy looking for the pebble in his boot while the horse gets a drink at the pool.
(Except Danny thought the cowboy might have been checking for scorpions, but I think he was was looking for the pebble that was bothering him.) The cowboy, you know.
The big, brave, horse-riding, lasso-throwing, steer-branding cowboy--worried about that pesky pebble in his boot.
So often it's the little things that bug us as much as or more than the big ones.
I pulled and pulled prickers out of two or three fingers, but one pesky one is still in there. And I couldn't find our needle-nose tweezers in the travel bag either--or at any of the stores we checked in around here.
So I just lift a prayer today.
A little prayer for all those who are searching for the pebble in their boot,
or are bothered by the cactus pricker in their finger--
\the relationship stings,
the gnats of ordinary troubles that are small but real,
and the zaps of fear and regrets and little hurts that bring the whimper out of us before we remember to be a big girl.
Please calm the sting, compassionate Lord,
and may the pebble drop out of the boot,
and slap the gnats,
and quiet our worried and bothered and quivering feet, fingers, and hearts.
Because of Your love Who bore hurts both great and small on Your cross and in Your heart,
Amen. 
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