i've been thinking about how quickly our lives can be redefined by the unexpected. i have a friend from college who quickly found her world turned upside down. in the last week or so, her
one-year-old daughter got sick. it started out with what seemed to be a stomach virus. within three days, her daughter went from not eating much to having seizures and slipping into a coma. initially the doctors thought the baby had a stroke, but they've ruled that out. the doctors aren't sure what's causing the seizures and are keeping the girl in a medicated comatose state until they can figure that out.
i began thinking about my friend, melissa, and the times we had in college. technically, she was a friend of friends but we still hung out occasionally. i began thinking about some of the fun times we had - of dancing silly in the halls or taking a "destination unknown" trip to dallas - and began wondering how those times would be redefined if she knew the pain and worry that was to come. how strange it is to me that we can be dancing in the streets one day, and holding the small hand of our child in ICU the next.
i think that perhaps we have the running-through-the-spring-fields-amidst-the-wild-lilies days so that we can bear the curled-up-in-darkess-surrounded-by-fear-and-despair nights. it's as if that bit of hope, as unrealistic as it may seem, that one day we'll return to those fields is an absolute necessity for us to get through this utterly unpredictable thing called life.
