North Dakota Socks for South Dakota Missionary

Wednesday night Jonathan and I arrived in Rapid City about 10 o'clock our time and 9 o'clock Rapid City time. In the parking lot on our way to the motor home that was to be our home for the next two nights during my chemo treatment, we passed the well-lit windows of Bible Christian Church where people were sitting listening to a revival message of Rev. John Brewer.

I tried not to feel too guilty for not arriving early enough to attend, but Jonathan had worked all day, we had struggled to get packed and on our way by seven our time for the 2 1/4 hour drive, and I am usually staying away from most populated situations except our little church Sunday morning and quick excursions.

As we got out of our warm van into the cold outdoors, I found myself feeling worn out, cold, and a little blue (and still feeling guilty). I wasn't sure what this different motor home was going to be like, since the evangelist and his wife were staying in the RV that Jonathan and I usually stayed in. 

But what should meet my astonished eyes inside but this sunshine basket with a card on top that said it was for me!

All thoughts of cold and guilt vanished with the warmth of this generous and beautiful surprise that I assumed was from someone in the church, because someone in the church had left a bag of edible treats for us another time. 

Whoever packed this basket must have known some things about me, because first of all, the basket was a clothes basket and who knew I needed a new clothes basket? This was the very best color for a clothes basket for me! Snuggled in with a fluffy antique rose blanket and a lush gray bath towel were extra virgin olive oil, pistachios, sunflower seeds, a pretty apron, Pioneer Woman dish towels (to replace some very worn out ones I have) french fried onions, some illustrated children's songs, a bath mat, and more.

What puzzled me most was the socks.  I could not understand why a South Dakota person would give a South Dakota missionary and cancer patient socks from North Dakota. That seemed most unusual. 

Until I opened the card and discovered to my surprise that the basket had come from my brother Hoshea and wife Laurie who are fellow missionaries to the Native Americans but clear up in North Dakota near the Canadian border, on the Turtle Mountain Indian Reservation.

Aha! 

Suddenly the socks held a meaning hitherto hidden, like the meaning one might discover at times behind unusual Christmas or birthday  gifts that one is tempted to only think about in relation to its usefulness to oneself, or the pleasure it might bring to oneself, with little to no thought of the giver's attitude, place in life, or motive.

Gracious receivers will value the giver more than the gift.

After reading that card signed by my dear sister-in-law Laurie, I looked again at the socks. 

Suddenly, North Dakota socks became meaningful to a South Dakota missionary lady. When I texted Hoshea and Laurie, I learned that they had sent the basket down with their son Andrew and his wife when the two came to the Black Hills for vacation recently.

The basket, with its North Dakota socks, had been sent with love from a brother and sister-in-law all the way down here to Rapid City.

Because of who the gift of socks was from and the love that sent them, this South Dakota lady will proudly wear those soft and cozy North Dakota bison socks!

A Girl Named Hopeful

Day after tomorrow, I am to get my third chemo infusion, but if you ever start feeling sorry for yourself, it is a good idea to go to a clinic or hospital or institution or nursing home where you will discover someone in worse shape than yourself. 

Today at the Divinity Wellness Clinic in Sioux Falls today where I went for a blood test and a Vitamin C IV, other patients were in the same room, including a father and daughter from Yankton. It was obvious that the girl was facing severe disabilities, including twisted feet and hands, not being able to talk or communicate in much of any way. Her eyes looked blank most of the time, except when the intravenous needle was pulled out of her arm. At that point, her face puckered, but the rest of the time, she lay with hardly a movement in her special wheel chair during her IV. Although I found a few subjects to discuss in a friendly manner with the nurse and the father, I did not ask any nosy questions in front of the girl.

"Had she been born this way, suffered a disease or an injury?" I wondered inside. 

And then, as the nurse spoke to the girl and called her by name for a second time, I knew I had heard correctly the first time. The girl's name was Hopeful! 

"Hopeful!" I exclaimed. "That is a beautiful name!"

Even in the face of whatever it was that she was facing, I thought, it was a beautiful name. The nurse said the names of the girl's siblings were also beautiful, so I asked what they were, and the father recited them for me, down a list of about six or seven names! 

"Big family!" I commented. "I have seven children, too!" 

Right at that moment, the father was wheeling the girl out of the room, but as she came by me, those same eyes that had seemed so blank, were suddenly large and bright. She was actually looking at me! I had not seen her looking at either the nurse or anyone else. But those eyes were looking at me, eyes that weren't quite coordinated, but one was looking straight at me!

"See you, Hopeful!" I said, touching her arm as she glided by me in her wheel chair. "Have a wonderful day!"

The nurse and father had been talking about therapies being done with the girl, and how she was being worked with to use her eyes to communicate. I don't know what the girl may have been trying to communicate, or if she was at all, but there was something about those eyes that were suddenly luminous as she was wheeled past me. Had she understood what I said, that her name was beautiful? Was she just glad to be leaving that room of IVs? Or was it something the Lord allowed to happen, to speak to my own heart--allowing a girl named Hopeful to look me in the eye, a lady in the middle of a cancer fight, wondering how long I have hope?

Either way, it was special to me, the large, beautiful eyes of a girl  named Hopeful. I learned later from the nurse, when I asked, that the girl had been in an accident a couple years ago, but the therapies that the family is finding for her here are making a difference in her improvement. 

I pray that hope will refresh the hearts of the girl and her family as they continue to work through the struggles and the caregiving. May there always be someone to speak a kind word to lift their spirits. And may we all have a wonderful day because of hope, and the God of hope, and His kindness to all of us in our troubles and heartaches.

 

Dog's Nose Meets Porcupine

Poor Teddy is Rose's golden retriever. After the hunting trip, Danny and Hannah had brought him from Colorado up here to South Dakota for a few weeks to be around our dog, Aspen, so that hopefully in a couple months there will be puppies.  

Teddy did his job well, and we assume there will be puppies down the road, but then--there was last night.

 

  When the family arrived back home from church, this is the sight that met their eyes at the gate. Teddy, like a nosy busybody, had stuck his nose into business that did not belong to him.

We don't know where Mr. or Mrs. Porky went, but Teddy was escorted into the house--where he isn't usually allowed.  

The sheer number of quills sent the children into despair. 

"Could we take him to the vet?" they asked.

"It's closed," I said. And that was that.

We had to figure out how to do this job ourselves.

Danny became master of quill pulling!

We had to pull out over fifty quills, not just from the poor dog's nose, but from the roof--yes, the roof of his mouth.  

You try to pull porcupine quills from the roof of a dog's mouth when he is hurting like crazy! 

My three brave braves and bravesses (is that a word?) or shall we say squaws, did a fantastic job, one quill at a time.

Teddy was totally amazing.  

After each quill pulled, we'd cheer, and Teddy would get a little break to shake his head and trot around the corner of the kitchen, into the hall and back again. Once those quills inside his mouth were out,  he was able to drink water from a bucket and enjoy a few bites of table scraps. 

The whole family worked with that poor dog for nearly two and a half hours. Occasionally, Danny would be able to yank two quills out at once, and once he got three at once. Did we ever cheer on that one! We finally got to bed about 11 o'clock, with still a few quills not pulled out, but we were exhausted, and so was the dog. The dog had been jerking his head away as soon as he sensed the pliers coming near, but he had become so tired that his eyes were closing, and while his eyes were closed in between each pull, Danny was able to yank just a few more quills before giving up for the night. 

 In the morning, a fat stick in the dog's mouth did the trick so that Danny could pull a few more quills.
"A stick is like Teddy's security blanket!" Rose laughed on family Signal chat. 

Danny deserves a gold medal, but so does Teddy!

As for the quills, they are sitting in Danny's room, ready to take to a Lakota native who does quilling. He makes expensive jewelry and other things from porcupine quills, and our pastor's wife suggested we take the quills to him. He has taught quilling in the local native college. 

Hopefully Teddy will behave himself after this, and not stick his nose where he has no business sticking it. 

Cinnamon Roll Joy--and Just One Day at a Time

Yesterday I managed to mix a huge batch of bread dough which Crystal and I turned into rolls, bread, and cinnamon rolls. Our chickens are laying fewer and fewer eggs, now just six a day, what with the short days and long nights, and I have to come up with different breakfasts than eggs.

 Cinnamon rolls sounded good for the family, I thought. It had been a while since we made those. 

I had no idea how I would use pictures of the proceedings in a blog post, but I was sure I would.

There was just something so tantalizing about showing the gooey honey cinnamon rolls as I was cutting the slices.  Despite what is going on in my life right now, it is satisfying to still be able to keep meals on the table for my family, and to even sometimes help with the baking of huge batches of rolls to keep my work guys (and an extra one or two) fed with homemade lunches each day.

A few days ago, in between two medical appointments that the cancer center had insisted on setting up for me (one of which was obviously unnecessary we discovered) Jonathan was heading inside to talk to the financial aid department while I tried to make my whoozy way out to the van parked at quite a distance because of the trailer on behind.

Jonathan had pulled a trailer because he always has materials to purchase at Menards or Lowes for the mission, for the reservation jobs, or us personally. This time he would run across a washer/dryer combo set that was needed for the Rosebud parsonage and we'd add that on top of the lumber and other material he had already purchased. 

But back to my walk out to the van. Despite how I was not feeling very good, I couldn't help noticing first the cool, fresh autumn air, and then the autumn foliage. I found myself reveling in the beauties of autumn leaves--right there along the drive into the hospital.

Later, as we pulled into McDonalds to get Jonathan his coupon special and "comfort food," an iced coffee, I noticed that roses were still blooming there! I had to jump out to take a good picture.

And there on the stones was a single rose petal, still beautiful,

like a single beautiful day in the midst of my cancer journey.

Just one day, one beautiful day when I am still able to get about on my own, still able to enjoy beauty, still able to be thankful instead of moaning to my heavenly Father with too much pain to do anything but endure.

And I thought what a grace it was to just take one day at a time. For today, to not take on the worry of what tomorrow holds--of pain or overwhelm or burdens too heavy to carry without His help. 

I think of the beauty of just doing one little job at a time--even if baking bread is the only extra job I get done in a day besides taking care of myself and seeing that my family's meals are made. 

I am glad I have the energy to carry the rolls to the oven and scrub the mixing bowl right away under the wonderful faucet Jonathan installed in our kitchen sink.  And the words to an old hymn that my sister Dorcas used to sing comes to me.

"Lord for tomorrow and its needs
I do not pray;
Keep me, my God, from stain of sin
Just for today.
Help me to labor earnestly,
And duly pray;
Let me be kind in word and deed,
Father today.

 Let me be slow to do my will,
Prompt to obey;
Help me to sacrifice myself,
Father, today.
Let me no wrong or idle word
Unthinking say;
Set Thou a seal up on my lips
Through all today.

 Let me in season, Lord, be grave,
In season gay;
Let me be faithful to Thy grace,
Father, today.
Lord, for tomorrow and its needs
I do not pray;
Still keep me, guide me, love me, Lord,
Through each today.

Amen."

 

 

 

 

When You Want to Scream and Throw Things (But You Don't, of Course!)

 One of the most frustrating things about this cancer battle is not so much the multiple miseries of chemo side effects (such as twitching muscles and nerves that are bothering me even as I write) but the not knowing. We didn't know if my body would be able to take chemo, and so we had a second treatment option that we are working toward, which includes a blood test that requires being off all cytotoxic agents and supplements for two weeks.  We had to plan this blood test in between chemos. And no antibiotics for 10 days. That would be okay if you didn't need any of that stuff, but what if you need them? What if you need your thyroid supplement to get through the day and some supplements for this and that?

What if you have staph infection? Chemo rash? I'm trying to get through just three more days to the blood test until I can start taking supplements again, and antibiotic if I need it. Until then, I was told to use oregano oil for the small boils (diluted of course, because that particular essential oil burns like crazy. (I don't usually cry with pain, but I was in my room crying with that the other day. Thankfully the burning pain goes away in about 15 or 20 minutes and the boils had practically melted away overnight, too, at least some of them. Then another one erupted. It is right on the bone in the center of my sternum. Too painful to try to apply oregano oil or warm compresses or to try to drain. It looks like a miniature volcano. 

Even the doctors don't seem to know what to do. Do we go with a less aggressive antibiotic and just take it consistently as a preventative, or do we hit the infection with something more aggressive but with worse side effects, including being hard on the digestive system, as if chemo hasn't already wrecked my whole body?

 

A little of my hair has hung on like the last leaves of autumn, but I know I look terrible.  

 On top of that, my stomach is bothering me a lot lately, nerves in my sides are twitching , and Hardly anything I eat agrees with me. I was letting myself eat some bread or pasta products, and I just don't feel good afterward. I pigged out on bits of the toastiest part of the garlic toast one evening, and paid for it later. When I couldn't resist a little raw honey, I don't feel good afterward, either. So treats are pretty much out. To say nothing of food not tasting good, most of it. 

And then on an extra hard day like today, after eating just a little supper, I had to go lie down hoping to get rid of the pain that was almost unbearable.

And then there was a misunderstanding that was a sudden jab, like the needle-sharp jab of this prickly pear cactus that went right through the sole of my worn out shoe once when Jonathan and I were walking through the field to the mailbox. (That was just before my last chemo, when for a day or two I had the energy to walk to the mailbox again. Hopping on one foot, I gave Jonathan my shoe and he pulled the cactus barb out with his trusty leatherman tool that he is never without.)

This evening I was back in the kitchen while the family was finishing hearty triangles of Jonathan's favorite peanut butter "pizza" and warm bacon-wrapped cheese-stuffed jalapenos.  And someone waved the jalapeno that they were eating up toward me and asked me if I didn't want it.  I didn't, and they knew I didn't like jalapenos, but all I could think was that I would have loved to eat a treat, too. To have someone else's treat waved in my face was too much. After nearly 2 years of watching everyone else enjoy the normal food and very often desserts that I also would like to eat, and not allowed to eat because of cancer, it was just too much. 

It just hurt. And when I said something about how I felt having treats that I cannot eat waved in my face, and how I want to scream and throw things, family members all react in different ways. One looks like I needed to grow up, another one anxiously tries to explain what had really been meant, and the person who had done it quickly and meekly apologizes--more than once. Everyone was horrified and felt bad, and I ended up falling apart and going into the living room in not just pain, but feeling like passing out. It was such a little thing, so stupid. It wasn't meant badly, but it had hit me badly. And I wanted to scream and throw things.

I didn't, of course. But I did cry. Later. In the office. After I had wandered back into the kitchen later and looked at all the good food on the counter that I could not eat and then in the cupboards, wondering what food I could eat that wouldn't make me feel bad. I don't usually cry, but tonight, I did. I finally went and got a bowl of yogurt that I had fixed for myself. Homemade goat milk yogurt with a tiny drizzle of agave nectar and some stevia in it. I sat at my desk in the office, writing a check to pay the water bill and gagging down yogurt, and crying. 

I let myself cry. I told myself it was okay, that maybe I needed to just cry. That it was okay. I repeat, it was okay. I had tried for well over two years to be brave, and had rarely cried. Tonight I cried.  

Out in the living room, I pick up a Voice of the Martyrs magazine, focusing on Vietnam. I hadn't felt like reading it earlier because I felt like I couldn't handle more burden on my heart right now, but with such a hurting heart and pained innards this evening, I knew that it would be good for me to read about believers in very difficult circumstances. It would help me gain perspective. So I read about a new believer in Vietnam who had lost her husband when he was beaten to death for being a Christian, and how she was evicted from her home and finally was allowed to stay in a sympathetic friend's pigpen with her young daughter. She would go out in the jungle and gather roots and fruit to feed herself and her daughter, and instead of selling extra ones she collected, she gave them instead to a poor elderly woman for whom no one in the village cared. Her light was shining for Jesus.  I read article after article about the Vietnamese Christians, how some were having to flee to Laos, and how others were being faithful to Christ despite the persecution, remaining there where the risk was great.

It made my problems look petty.  We had a happy family meal tonight, even if I did have to leave in the middle and go stretch out in the recliner. From there, I had read no less than three chapters out loud from a book that just arrived in the mail in exchange for a couple of mine. This one was from Dorcas Smucker, a fellow conservative Christian blogger. Her insights and humor about middle age motherhood are interesting to all ages, and there were gales of laughter at different spots in the chapters. 

 I was glad I hadn't screamed and thrown things. I just had spoken up about how I felt. And I had read about people who have it worse. And then I cried. And that was okay. 

And it's all better now.

Routine--the Blessing of It

 

  One doesn't appreciate the joy and blessing of routine until you are deprived of it, facing gigantic challenges, frightening changes, and frustrating new normals.

I appreciate the strength to still hang laundry outdoors on the warmer days, although I don't have much energy left to bring in firewood for the wood box.  I used to help do that as it got me outside in the fresh air and sunshine.

Now I count it a privilege to be able to make scrambled eggs in the morning,

and make sandwiches and other lunch fixings for my guys who head off to work not long after sunrise.

I am grateful when I have enough normal routine in my day to have my usual morning prayer time when I add prayer to a reading of an oppressed nation to pray about, from a booklet from Voice of the martyrs.  As I read it, I pray, sometimes out loud, over every detail.  

I find myself enjoying simple tasks such as refilling the glass, decorative soap jar by our kitchen sink--and writing "soft soap" on the list for the next trip to Walmart. 

I grind wheat or spelt to make a huge, fresh batch of rolls, as my work guys eat those rolls up awfully fast!

And with leftover boiled potatoes, I make potato salad to add alongside lunches for my 18-year-old's bottomless stomach and a fellow workman, Lance, who has been very faithful to come to work, stay off of drink, and save money for a vehicle. 

I offered to send along lunches for him, too, as he seems to be trying very hard and is such a help.

Sometimes I get out of the routine just a bit and light a candle, such as on a day when all the family is gone at the same time, and the house seems strangely still and lonely.

Have you ever noticed how a little flickering candle seems almost alive?

But candles don't hold a candle to the routine of welcoming a living person who comes home day after day, 

my hubby who greets me with a kiss despite my nearly-bald head and pale face and everything else that can't be described publicly when you are fighting the kind of cancer I am. 

He's one that enjoys something a little out of the ordinary--fresh, warm sopapillas fried by Crystal and drizzled with honey!

Like the sweet, tender, fresh mercies of the Lord that brighten one's day every so often--

in fact, very often,

making our routines a blessing and our out-of-the ordinary treats perfectly blissful!

Tom Got 6x6 Elk!

 This hunting season Rose's husband Tom got a 6x6 elk!

His brother also got a 6x6! 

 

Carrie got a buck! 

And Rose got a deer!

The rest of us did not get anything yet.  We resorted to frozen sausage to make lasagna recently. 

Danny decided his lasagna paper plate was a new kind of work of art--

"Halloween!" he laughed.