Everyday is a fight for peace and comfort

929: I don’t recognize my life sometimes. I go about, seeing things that remind me of things passed. Yesterday, I was in a narrow valley, the walls or ridges that created the valley very close, and high. It reminded me of regular scenes in the Smoky Mountain’s. I thought, I’ll go backpacking soon in the Smokys. I also drove near the Sheltowee Trace. I thought, now is when I would begin to hike the 300 mile trail, bit by bit and finish it sometime this year. I saw bicycle riders, riding along a county road in the glorious warm sunshine. And I thought, oh man, I’ll go along with them the next time. Of course, I can not do any of these things right now, things so regular, my mind assumes I can, plans a trip, then remembers my limitations. It does bring forth swells of sadness. I spend a lot of time walking and getting exercise as much as I can. I do this believing one day I will return to my favorite activities. I am inclined to think, I may not make it all the way back and I try to shush those thoughts. Jesus said (in so many words) as a man thinks, so is he. I read everything I can, meditate, and try to place myself in a new, totally healed body. I believe, based on a persons faith, miracles occur all the time. I believe that I may be totally healed, and I may one day, climb Mount LeCont (in the Smoky’s), or ride my bike 100 miles again. I believe this because one look outside in nature, there are things more miraculous than what I ask. There are things more astonishing in everyday life. How can I not believe in total healing when even more wonderful things fill my everyday world? Yet, there are times I do not believe as much as other times. I am most vulnerable when I am tired. I spent four days in Lexington visiting my Son and Grandson. It was exhausting. When I got home, I feel into a deep sleep, and I was so thankful for the absolute miracle of the weekend. However, when I woke the next day, I was so tired, I didn’t think I had the strength to even open my eyes. It was all so emotional, and physically exhausting. Even though I could hardly move, I got in my jeep and drove out to my old cabin. There is a field near there, where I like to go and rest. Sometimes I throw out a sleeping bag on the ground and rest. Other times, I open up all of the window and doors to my truck and rest in the back – where I have fixed up a bed for myself. I was so tired, I made it easy on myself and laid down in the ready made bed in the back. The warm breeze wafted through the jeep bringing the sound of the nearby creek and it was embedded with wild bird song. I slept so soundly as to dream. Some unknown time later, I woke, and could feel the intense early spring sunshine on my feet and lower legs. I raised up and re-entered consciousness lightly. The birds where singing, the creek falling, the breeze wafting through the opened doors, and I noticed a herd of deer foraging a couple hundred yards away. I as at peace.

Reunion

There are time, in fact we always hope for the best but prepare for the worst. That is, if we’re well adjusted, and are living an emotionally healthy life. Not that I don’t often struggle with “the next right thing to do”, or that I always have the best emotional outlook upon everything. None of us are perfect, but some of us are further along the “path of enlightenment” than others. In this category five storm that has been my life for about the past three years, I’ve certainly been driven “underground” emotionally, and I know that I am shell shocked, suffer form post traumatic stress about every other emotional dysfunction there is. Even though I conduct my life from inside of a bomb shelter, figuratively speaking, that doesn’t prevent me from occasionally coming up with the correct emotional path to follow, as I did this week, coming to Lexington to be with my boys over this first reunion since Jonathon (my son) entered rehab last October. Even though I thought I had some idea, as we’ve been fighting our Son’s addiction for six years, I didn’t. Anyone who has addicted children know how absolutely insane life can get.  Just when you thought you’ve seen it all, or that things couldn’t possibly get any worse, they do, and by multiples of one hundred percent. So when my ex-wife, Katie and my son Jonathon planned their trip to Lexington to see our grandson, and my son’s son, I approached it all with grave caution, hope for the best but certainly prepared for the worst. And the worst in this case I knew could get pretty darn ugly. My little immediate family consists of my son, my ex-wife, my grandson, Carter, and his mom Chelsea. Out Son’s recent excursion “off the deep end” sent everybody running for emotional shelter as we watched our loved one crash into behaviors that were so hurtful and unbecoming and so potentially life threatening.  I had no idea how this weekend would go, but I had in mind a spectrum  of possibilities from very positive all the way down to the unthinkable.  Jonathon has been struggling greatly trying to prepare himself from the damages the substances caused, so as we sat in our hotel room waiting for Chelsea (who had long since ceased to even talk to my son) an d Carter, his son, to arrive.  He was beside himself, so nervous, yet so excited to see his little toddler son. I had become worried about my son and his relationship with Carter. I didn’t know if he would remember my Son that well, or if he would be so cautious as to hurt my son’s feelings, heaping more wreckage weight upon Jonathon’s shoulders.. Passing the floor of the small room, suddenly the knock on the door came and when Jonathon pushed it wide open, there stood little two foot high Carter. As the boys gazed upon each other, Carter had a moment of puzzlement on his face, then broke into the biggest most beautiful smile ever contorted in the Universe, as Jonathon bent over to embrace little his son, little carter laughed in happiness, and my son started to cry tears of Joy I’ve never seen in my son. The last time my Jonny had seen Carter, he couldn’t walk or talk. When Carter leaped out of Jonny’s embrace, he ran down the hallway of the hotel shouting the words “Daddy!!”, and none of us could hold back our tears.

The weekend has proceeded far beyond my wildest expectation. Even Chelsea, who we didn’t expect to even speak to Jonny really came around.  After three days of watched this little family, Jonathon, Carter and Chelsea play and laugh together, I am reminded how much good is left in Gods Universe for me… for us. I know the kids have a long long way to go, and there is much forgiveness and much learning and growth to occur before they can even know for sure if they will get back together. But if they could just remain happily separated, that would be far far more than I had hoped for. To see them so happy and so engaged with little Carter is just simply the most beautiful thing I have ever ever seen in my lifetime. I couldn’t’ hope to experience a more joyful time, or events as I have in the past 72 hours. And I Thank and Praise God for every ounce of it.