"Search for the longing, O you who love me." Old Saint

   During our son's birth the doctor spoke to his nurse about his golf game. A veteran of hundreds of deliveries, he had stopped seeing the magic we felt as that tiny being emerged to begin his life journey.

   Seven years into my forty-four year marriage, I grew a mustache. Six months later, I shaved it off while my five-year-old soon watched. To his astonishment my wife didn't notice the change until I finally pointed it out.

  I had forgotten the texture of the sofa that has comforted me numerous times. The falling light was lost on me until I aimed my camera at it.

   Have you looked at that painting on your bedroom wall? When have you studied your left hand – not because it hurt, but just to admire it?

   The challenge in caregiving can be overcoming the hypnosis of repetitive work. After the five hundredth elderly patient enters hospice, how does the caregiver sustain interest in the new patient's story?

   If we forget the story of the person before us, we are at risk for treating patients as their disease. 

   It takes great courage to stay in a Love that includes pain and boredom.

   When a doctor friend was hospitalized, he was stunned to be treated as "the gall bladder."

   "The housekeeper was the one person I wanted to see each day. If it hadn't been for her I would have felt like a number.  I had no idea…"

   This doctor had been practicing for twenty-five years. He had "no idea" that he had subconsciously distanced himself from his patient's experience.

   It requires a heart shift to notice the way our feet touch the earth, how our loved one looks in every evening light, to see the wrinkles and scars on our own hands.

   When I saw the workmen at left, I imagined them caught in their own web.

   The hazard of repetition is boredom. The risk of boredom is that we miss out on our lives. 

   The world has taught us how to avoid a whole variety of pains. College students would rather "Google" a fact than absorb it into the context of memory. We want robots to do more and more of our work. 

   Terrified (understandably) of depression, we take Prozac. Scared of fading sexuality old men take Viagra. Tired of hearing the same patient complaints, doctors imagine the golf course. 

   To minimize insensitivity, some seek to expand their horizons. Doctors may take art classes not to enhance their painting but to deepen their attention. Nurses may let go of power walks to take in what their hearts can only embrace at a slow pace.  

   If we fail to practice presence we risk our health and our ability to heal others. If we give up on full Love, we give up on a full life.

   The "longing" of the old saint is not to be free of pain or boredom. He longed for a Love strong enough to encompass every bit of life.

-Erie Chapman 

photos copyright erie chapman 2011 – photo of flags copyright tia chapman 2011

For those reading this on Monday,

Happy Memorial Day!

May we always honor those who serve!