Days 55-59 – Where Memories Scroll – Journal of Sacred Work

"Glance at the wheeling Orb of change,/ And greet it with a kindly smile…" Tennyson.

Children play in a colored orb. Writing the first pages of life they are unburdened by memory and also have yet to know recollection's joys.

Wisdom teaches that change is certain. Why not greet it "with a friendly smile?" Instead, you may have spent many days on this turning earth trying to make it stay still.

You may look at your children or at any given moment of happiness and want to freeze it as you would the image in a photograph. Of course, no genie can grant such a desire.

What appears on your scroll of memories when you read through your years of caregiving? Do you recall how the sunlight felt as you walked through the parking lot on your first day? Do you remember your first patient?

What an odd thing resumes are. They list where you went to school, what licenses you may have and where you have worked.

Resumes say nothing about the texture of your experience – the joys and irritations of colleagues now vanished, the feel of the fluorescent lights you worked under day after day, the sounds in the hallways you walked down hundreds of times.

The people interviewing you never ask if you remember how you felt when you walked up to receive your diploma. They just want to know if you have one.

Your resume is public. Your most important memories are private and personal.

You will collect new memories today. On another day somewhere in the future, you will scroll through those memories and read, there, the story of the choices you have made.

-Erie Chapman

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Categories: Reflections, Holidays, Spirituality

Tags: caregivers, Erie Chapman, scroll of memories, Tennyson

6 responses to “Days 55-59 – Where Memories Scroll”

~liz Wessel

February 24, 2014 at 9:13 am

Your meaningful words and eloquent images are stirringly beautiful, Erie. A smile, a gentle upturn of the mouth can shift our focus from fear to gratitude. I love that you call us to mindful awareness that life is always passing. As I heard someone once say, “That 101 year old woman lying in this bed was once a baby!“ Living in awareness of this truth, evokes a natural cherishing and honoring of our days here. As we love our lives away may our sweetest memories continue to linger. Thank you for today’s gift, Erie.

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Cheri Cancelliere

February 24, 2014 at 11:34 am

I remember my 96-year-old grandmother saying, “I woke up this morning and thought, How did I get so old? It seems like just yesterday I was walking to my first day of school in my new red shoes that hurt my feet.”
I could see the little girl behind the wrinkles. The young bride. The worried mother. The joy. The sorrow. The choices. The regrets. All bound together in a beautiful volume, for my grandmother was truly an example of a life well lived.
I’m beginning to understand. I recently reconnected with a dear childhood friend. As we shared, it really did seem like it was just yesterday. We each took a different road and sometimes I wonder which of us made the better choice. But here we are again, having ended up in the same place. It is so precious to share the last chapters with someone who shared the first.
We still have choices to make but each day is a gift to share with those to whom we are more than words on a resume. And in the end, we will see that God was on every page whether we realized it or not. Thank you Erie, for always reminding us how precious each day and each person we meet is in the metanarrative of the story of our life.

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erie chapman

February 25, 2014 at 9:18 am

Thank you, Liz and Cheri. As you said, Cheri, “It is so precious to share the last chapters with someone who shared the first.” It is also precious to have angels as wonderful as you two to share THESE days with.

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sbeng

March 1, 2014 at 1:07 am

The other day I was going through my paperwork; all the names of the hospitals I have worked and and memories of those ”yester” years flooded my soul. Yes, the “wheeling Orb of change…” has turned fast. I embellished the thoughts of being able to travel far and wide and enriched my life coming across wonderful colleagues that I have met along this path and spent precious times with them and learning from them. As I pondered what to write this song flooded my soul. “As I travel down life’s pathway know not what the years may hold . As I ponder, hopes grow fonder, Precious memories flood my soul. Precious memories how they linger How they ever flood my soul In the stillness of the midnight Precious sacred scenes unfold”. I think I have greeted those “yester” years with a smile. Thank you Erie for your quotation from Tennyson

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Terry Chapman

March 1, 2014 at 5:42 am

In my volunteer ministry I help folks write their resume with the usual information and list of achievements, at least on the better written ones. But what I love doing is what I call the “Real Resume” which lists in varied styles the things that you truly cherish and are proud of having been or done in your lifetime to that moment; such as in my case the first item states: “Raised my two sons to successful adulthood!” which to me is probably my greatest and proudest achievement–not to others but to my true self!

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erie chapman

March 1, 2014 at 1:18 pm

Thank you Liz, Cheri, Suan and Terry.
Terry, thanks so much for sharing your comments on your work around THE REAL RESUME. Yes, this is what counts. And I know for a fact that YOU have truly had (and are having) a rich and fulfilling life.

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