Healing

I took the picture of these oyster shells in Murrell's Inlet last spring. It seemed like the whole river bank all around was made up of oyster shells. Today I went to talk to an Episcopal priest, Jeff Wallace, who is a hospice chaplain here in Myrtle Beach. He has invited me to consider being employed as a very part time on call chaplain. I have always valued the work of hospice nurses and volunteers and had a couple of opportunities to be called to be with dying hospice clients when I was a priest in Whitman. As we were talking today I shared how as I shopped for the handicapped woman for Christmas I really felt Marsha's loss. He said maybe I shouldn't have taken a name this year. I said that the moments when I miss her the most are the moments when I have the best memories of Marsha. You know I would not miss the memories of those things about her for all the pain in the world. It is in those moments with that mixture of joy and sorrow that I heal from my loss and celebrate what I've lost all at the same time. It is like the irritation that causes an oyster to form a pearl. It is not simple, life is complicated but we discover our path as we go and as we pray, and we heal from the issues we encounter along the way. I guess I want to say that we learn as much about living in the tough times as in the times of blessing. They often show us the most beautiful things that we might have missed.