Meat and Potatoes

I am not a big meat eater, even though I was raised on that foundation as a child of the Midwest.  Potatoes and beef provided sustenance for our family.  Vegetables were just tolerated and usually existed only as corn, peas or beans.  No wonder constipation was always an inevitable!  Yet, even in spite of that, there is nothing like a Sunday dinner with Mom's roast beef, gravy, mashed potatoes, along with Dad's favorite Lima beans, and oh, don't forget the gelatin salad.  Perhaps there would be  crescent rolls too.  Sharing it with family including wives or girlfriends or grandchildren that made it even taste better . . . 

Just as you could always count on meat and potatoes, there are people that have graced my life that have given me that same savory satisfaction.  Individuals who were who they said they were;  "what you saw was what you got"; basic, down to earth, without pretense, humble, simple and kind.  Individuals who exhibited joy, unconditional love, passion and faithfulness.  You always left their presence feeling full!

I have had the privilege of entertaining Faithful Women in my life for several years.  I started having a group of six such women about 11 years ago.  I wanted to honor women who had been so loving and faithful to my family, as my mother had been to me.  The first tea that I had for my ladies was in honor of my mother who had been the best example of faithfulness to me throughout all her 89 years.  Each year since it had been an annual event, until recently due to the hardships of elderly life, I could not gather all the women since several of them are in a care center.  Adapting to this change, I have visited each of them once a year, taking them treats and spending moments together catching up with one another.  Faithful Women have blessed me over and over!

Maureen was one of my group.  She was one of the first faces who greeted my young family when we first returned to church, and she became a firm supporter of  all of us these past twenty years since that friendship began.  Her eyes gleamed with joy, passion and encouragement.  She was one who completely, unreservedly heard my heart, never ashamed to weep with you or if needed to chastise you in the right direction.  Her thinking and motivation challenged me, especially to not be content with the easy path or well traveled road.    

I had hit a wall.  Emotionally and physically, I was spent.  I read my email on my phone that Maureen was in hospice and I could do nothing but cry.  I couldn't "get it together."  Tears seemed to be uncontrollable and inconsolable.  Yet, I had to for I was at work!   My first patient of the afternoon was an elderly female, and as I walked in the room I had to choke back my emotions that seemed to be stuck in the back of my throat.  I had to cut my day short, I couldn't even think. . . 

Two weeks later, she passed in the gentle arms of her adopted daughter Thuy.  I made a point to see Thuy before the funeral service, and together we wept.  We had lost a faithful woman . . . 

Maureen was meat and potatoes, a woman of substance and goodness.  I don't want her generation to pass, that generation that possessed commitment and spirit, just like my own mother.  Those are the ones who were truly excited to be a follower of Jesus and really lived the life.  When they leave, I feel a deep vacuum, another gigantic hole in the foundation that has gotten me thus far in life.  Somehow, you always feel so unprepared with death, even though it is inevitable for all of us.  The question lingering is how do I go on from here?

Today, I actually have made a beef roast and plan to serve it with mashed potatoes and gravy.  I am beginning a new chapter in life, I am finding myself with an expanded and open heart to what lies ahead.  I am not sure of what that may be.  I am just writing for today. . . 

But this I know for now. . .

"This I recall to my mind, therefore I have hope.

The Lord's lovingkindnesses indeed never cease, for his compassions never fail,

They are new every morning; great is thy faithfulness.

'The Lord is my portion', says my soul.

Therefore I have hope in Him.  The Lord is good to those who wait for Him."

(Lamentations 3: 21-25)

That is my meat and potatoes . . .