Still, there are similarities. Sticking with the journey analogy, he has passed some landmarks that are familiar to me and not necessarily in a good way. We take a lot and he's shared with me his thoughts and feelings as his mother's health and cognitive functioning declined over the past several year or so.
My heart broke for him, for example, when he called me one day a while back and told me that for the first time, his mom hadn't recognized him when he went to see her earlier in the day. It's not often in life you can tell someone you know how they feel, and mean it, but that day, I could and I did.
His mother's health has declined significantly the last couple of weeks. Last weekend, one of the hospice nurses told him she thought the end was near. His older brother made arrangements to travel from Jacksonville, FL, ostensibly to say goodbye.
And then something amazing happened.
While my friend was visiting with his mom last weekend, she looked at him and said, "Hi, Mike," more lucid than she had been in months. She talked with him about his life, and his children, and told him she was sorry things had been hard for him. He hadn't been able to talk with his mom like that in many, many months, probably more than a year. And he had never expected to be able to again.
Now, I believe things like this just don't happen on their own. I believe this is precisely the kind of thing that God has a hand in. I really do.
Mike is one of the kindest, most patient, best people I know. He's the classic middle child, it seems to me. He took care of his father and visited him often, for several years, at the assisted living facility where he lived before he died. He's done the same with his mother with little or no help from his siblings.
I believe God knows that. Of course that's what I believe. And I also believe that God's gift to Mike was a few stolen moments and a quiet, lucid conversation with his mother. What greater gift?
What greater gift indeed?
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