Cold and Broken in Meeting Mr. Jesus Christ

The Winter Of My Life has arrived, ushered in with emotional, physical, financial, spiritual and personal ruin, leaving me utterly emptied, broken and ready for God to shape me into whatever He has planned for me.

Crushing the fruit of the vine is necessary for a good wine to be created. Some time has passed for this harvest, more branches have been pruned than I believed a vine could survive without. Yet I am here and alive, though I feel empty.

Certain things, mostly of the material nature, have little influence or affect on my life. Provision for food and shelter have near always been met, my Maker has been very good to me. The optional “needs” such as a car, lots of clothing, money in the bank have never been my pursuits. I've struggled throughout my life with physical and mental health, but both of these have been improving the past several years as God has seen fit to bless and use me.

Recently I've learned I have a weakness which forever I had believed was a strength, enough to be proud of. Though I enjoy quiet, walks in the woods, reading a good book, generally being alone, I learned this is not always true of me. 2013 has been a year of slowly becoming more alone month by month ultimately finding me entirely shy of all but my relationship with God.Yes that is a good thing, but I've done a whole lot of grieving this year, and now am faced with the worst of it yet.

The past few months have been an up and down struggle with this bipolar illness. I think at last count there had been four full series of medication changes and though the last one seems to beginning to show some positive mental results, physically I feel sicker than I have in years. Between exhaustion, nausea, tremors, vision troubles and headaches I've wanted to throw in the towel, but it was tossing the towel which put me in this position. I hadn't realized until the doctor pointed out to me I had made the choice to reduce my medication because I thought I was feeling better. Yep, I was feeling 'better' alright. Mania was on my doorstep for several months and I didn't recognize it's knock. Too bad.

Issues with my still broken foot have surely served at times to bring me down to feeling a bit hopeless as well. In the past six weeks a small amount of progress in the bones healing has shown in x-rays so ultrasound, exercises and physical therapy have been added. In another three weeks an MRI will be performed to determine details. Fortunately the therapies are all activities I do at home because a week or so ago I sent my poor ole Hooptie away forever.

In honesty Hooptie was not much of a car, to call her a garage ornament would have been far more descriptive. She was pretty, but sat long with line leaks, multiple flat tires, sudden fluid drains, a blown head gasket and a cracked block. I should have named her Money Pit from the start. In the end I only took a $1,375 loss on the deal. Never have I been so happy to sign over a title to another person. Live and learn.

The weather here has been uber crazy since June, this past few weeks hasn't seen an improvement. Friday the 20th we were in the third day of rainy-snowy weather, kind of a slushy stuff when the temperatures dropped and we fell under a severe ice storm. Around 3 am my power went out, taking my electric and heat with it. By Saturday night this entire section of the state was paralyzed by the storm. I took shelter in layers of clothes, hoodies, hat and gloves, in my bed under a stack of quilts. By Monday I was very cold. My son called to see if my power was back on as his had been restored. Our power company predicted outage until the 28th, too much to endure, so Tuesday morning Ryan came for me. When he arrived my house temperature was 17 degrees and one could see the vapor of their breath. The thick frost on the windows was the only pleasurable part of that week.

Before leaving to stay with my son I had to do the hardest thing I've done in my lifetime. Tucker had been having a series of small strokes over the past two weeks and I made the decision to have him euthanize. He had been suffering for several years with hip problems, arthritis had become debilitating, blindness was taking him as well. The stokes were more than I could see him suffer. Before we were in the hospital Tucker had another stroke in the parking lot, taking a minute to recover enough to walk inside. I was holding up well until he stopped outdoors, stood looking around as if he was enjoying one last look at the world, then started licking my face. I was so uncertain of my decision. We were together until the very end. I miss him so much I can barely think straight, in fact this is the first time I have been able to even type the words.

I've had many phone calls from people who knew and loved Tucker. I've not been able to call anyone at this point. I'm just too broken, empty, lonely...I had no idea how much he was a part of my life for nearly eleven years. I can't write any more tonight. Here is a picture of Tucker, drawn in May.