We were not expecting a call from the cancer care center yesterday on our family excursion to the Badlands this Christmas break. My PET scan had happened Tuesday, but then Christmas came.
I had not expected any news until Monday at least, and maybe not before my appointment with the radiologist on Friday of next week. So when I saw that a call had not rung through on my phone, I listened to the voice mail.
Monument Cancer Care Center wanted me to confirm an appointment with my oncologist right away on Monday. I knew this could not possibly be good news. But it meant that my PET scan report must be in, so while we were parked at a spot with signal, Jonathan pulled up my patient portal on his phone and checked to see if the report had been uploaded yet to my portal.
I wasn't sure we should be doing this right now.
Should we ruin our happy family time together?
Or was it necessary for our time to be ruined--or could we simply surrender to what God allows and enjoy the family time together?
Yes, the PET scan result page was right there.
I leaned over and we looked it over together.
Why did this have to drop into our laps right during a family excursion to the Badlands?
Well, because that is where we happened to be.
Not because God was mad at me.
Not because He was punishing us.
Not because He must be nasty.
It just happened to be that way--us in the front of the van while the children listened quietly behind us.
Uptake (of the radioactive ingredient in the intravenous fluid which lights up abnormal cells) was high in the skin lesion area and also lighting up seriously in my right lymphatic area. We could understand that much in the wording of the report.
So that was the bad news, but the good news was that there was no uptake elsewhere, at least that we could read.
There were still one or two trails we wanted to walk, though we weren't sure how they were going to turn out since we'd never walked them before. But just after seeing this news about my PET scan, we pulled over at a trail in an area called "Oasis of the Badlands," the one place in the Badlands where any significant trees grew.
Cedars met our gaze as we set off on foot up the board walk, cedars covered with tiny, blue, round seedcones that looked a bit like frosty blueberries.
The blue color seemed to almost perfectly match the color of the beautiful South Dakota blue sky--like small, blue pearls from heaven--reminding us that even in our troubles and extremities on earth, God gives little bits of Himself to us, little bits of heaven on earth--
like this time two days after Christmas when we could have a bit of family time and enjoy God's creation and our precious new granddaughter who has brightened this Christmas season for us all--a little pearl from heaven, along with all the other bits of heaven on earth that strengthen us when our heart is tempted to be downcast.
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