By 5 a.m. she was up and an hour and half later, showered, dressed and breakfasted, she was ready to be back at Hospice with my dad. Aside from her desire to get there sooner than later- it also gave me a chance for the changing of the guard allowing my brother to go back to mom’s house and get some sleep, eat something decent and chill a bit before doing it all again tonight. Billy had a dose of morphine soon after we’d arrived – but he was awake enough to give “knuckles” to my mom when she reached for his hand. The nurse thought he’d been plagued a long time with arthritis in his hands because they looked so stiff and swollen…”no,” I told her – “that’s new”…more and more edema in his extremities. Slowly the fluids will continue to back up in his system. No more meds to help rid the body of what the heart can’t take care of…the pump is just too weak.
Sticking to my guns of the lipstick threat of yesterday -when my phone vibrated- I stepped outside to have the conversation. All reports of the last 12 hours given…everyone was informed. After a few minutes of sitting in the warmth of the morning sun with the faintest tinge of crispness in the air, I realized that summer is waning – but I’m still in Indiana. It was time to go back inside. As I got up from strattling a pretty fountain with no water in it – one foot in and one foot out – I lifted my head to see the shekinah glory…hovering right above the entrance to hospice. Well of course, it’s there – I’ve been feeling it all along.
Just the tiniest residual of Sunday School imagination made this come true but my rational mind says this is actually a contrail, vapor trail or jet trail whatever it’s called…from one of the gazillion jets a day coming to or from O’Hare that has part of its trajectory over this part of the state. But I didn’t have to see it, it didn’t have to be right over the entrance…but it was – my shekhinah glory…just for me.
Shekhinah means to settle, inhabit or dwell. And just when I need things to mean what I want them to – I turn to WIKIPEDIA: “The Shekhinah is held by some to represent the feminine attributes of the presence of God (shekhinah being a feminine word in Hebrew), based especially on readings of the Talmud.[1} And I needed it today – when I can’t figure out why this is taking so long, when I’m too tired to be gracious, when I could sleep 20 hours, get up and sleep some more. But shekhinah is here – hovering – knowing what’s what – in charge. My shekhinah.
1eyedmonkee 