This is a continuation of the previous stories, “The Prayer,” and “My Prayer.”  Some of the references will not make sense if you have not read them also.

So here I am again, wandering the hall of a hospital.  New town, new doctors, new rooms, new nurses, same story.  She finally fell asleep.  We have been here since yesterday trying to figure some things out.  The models at Vogue have nothing on her.  They have taken so many pictures of her body they could fill a magazine for a year.  After the thirteenth blood draw I was starting to look for long fangs on the nurses, someone here has to be a vampire.  I quietly have sat in my plastic chair, trying to be her rock.  Trying to bring comfort and relief.  Feeling like I have been failing miserably at all of the above.  They have finally found something that would at least take the edge off of her pain.  She fell asleep fitfully at first, but then slowly got into a rhythm.  I had to move.  My body hurts.  I told the nurse’s my phone number and told them to call me if she wakes up.  I need to wander.  I need breathe.

I need to clear my head, but that is the problem.  I can’t.  We are exhausted.  Physically we are running on fumes.  That would seem to be enough, but that is not the hardest part.  The hardest part of this journey is the mental part.  We don’t walk a straight line.  Most of it is uphill.  There are no halftimes, timeouts, or commercials.  We are just on all of the time.  Our story playing on and on.  It’s not even in HD.  Our weariness is so overwhelming it is like watching our life in black and white, everything is fuzzy and every once in a while we get that blank stare like when on the old tv’s you would get the rainbow screen with, “We are having technical difficulties.”  I have to keep moving or I will just crash, or at least that is what I tell myself.  I might crash to begin with, but then it turns into a crash up derby with my bed as I toss and turn because my body just wants me to stop.  It’s telling me that it is tired, So tired that it can’t get comfortable.  So of course I do the opposite and get out of bed.  I wander lost in thought of the next big climb.  The next set of stairs to get us where we need to be.  Trying to pull courage out of my little toe because it feels like all the rest of it has been used up.  Whether it is true or not I feel like I must have enough courage for all of us.  I feel like I need to be William Wallace standing in front of my army willing all of us to succeed.  Willing all of us to heal.  Probably carrying burdens that I don’t need to carry, but that is just my nature, so I do it anyway.

I start walking hallways and then different hallways on different floors.  I won’t admit to myself what door I am looking for but I know that if I wander long enough I will find it.  This is a big hospital and it is all new but it will be here, and I will find it.  After an hour of aimlessly walking on purpose I find my door and slowly walk in.  Hoping that I might find a moment of peace in the midst of chaos.  I sit down and try to find it.  I don’t ask “why” anymore.  It is what it is.  My thoughts turn to how to heal her and Miracles.  I suddenly feel a rush of sadness.  I keep hoping Walter or Father Francis would come walking in this door and tell me that everything was alright.  That we were all going to be okay.  That someday all of this was going to be worth it.  They are not here and I can’t be here anymore either.  I get up and go.  I need some fresh air.  I jump out the first outside door I run into.  I just need to breathe,  My anxiety goes into overdrive, my heart is racing.  I take in deep breaths trying to get under control.  I just want to scream, I want to crush something, I want to show something that I am in control of what is happening in my life.  I feel it coming and I try to hold it back.  I choke on my tears as they try to get out.  I won’t let them.  I shake as I hold them in.  Every muscle in my body is contracted as I squeeze the sadness so that it won’t get away.  I don’t win.  My sadness flows from my eyes as the tension from I don’t know how long is released.  I crumble to the ground with my back against the wall and my head in my hands.  My burdens fall to the ground with each drop.

I slowly gather myself up.  I really don’t feel any better or worse, more numb than anything else.  I just sit there and stare at nothing.  Feeling more embarrassed that I lost control, and very thankful that it is dark and the middle of the night and no one is around.

“Are you done?”

I about jump out of my skin.  I ran out of the building so fast I didn’t notice the wheel chair sitting to my right in the corner.  If I didn’t know better I would think that I am in the movie “Houseboat.” I am Cary Grant and Sofia Loren is talking to me.  She says it again in a beautiful Italian accent,

“Are you done?”

I am so caught off guard I really don’t know what to say, so I just say, “yes.”

“Gooood,” she says, “I am niiinty-twooo years old and I no-a-like-a people to be sad.”

I am gaining my senses and I ask, “Why are you here?”

“Ahh,” she says, “I sleep-a when I die, I make-a them bring me out-a here whenever I want too.”

“Okay,” I say, “but why are you here?” As I gesture to the hospital in general.

She throws her hands in the air in a grand gesture of disdain and says.  “My-a damn kids-a put me-a in a here.  They-a think-a there is a miracle-a waiting for a-me-a here. I a-have-a the cancer,  I am-a niiinty-twooo.  It is all-a-ready a miracle that I have-a lived -a- this a long.”

I chuckle and smile for the first time in thirty-six hours.  It feels really good.

“And zyou,” she says, “Why are you here?”

I begin to relay our story.  How we have been fighting for so long, and how we are so tired and worried and stressed.  I finished up and we sat in silence for a few minutes and I began to wonder if maybe she had fallen asleep, then she finally spoke up.

“So you-a here for-a miracle-a too?

I really wasn’t ready for that question.  I had really never thought about it like that, but the more I thought about it I guess she was right.  So I said, “yes I guess that is why we are here.”

“Tsk tsk tsk,” She says, “The foolishness of -a- the young-a-people,  you-a-think-a that-a miracle is-a easy.  Just-a-cause its a miracle does-a- not -a- make it -a painless.”

Yes, okay, I felt the slap in the face.  I raise my hands in a “slow down” gesture and say, “No that’s not what I’m thinking.  Sometimes I wonder if God is hearing me though,”

“Tsk Tsk Tsk,” she says again,  “He is-a- hearing -a- you-a- fine.  You no pay attention to what-a- he-a-doing worth a darn”

Yep, okay,slap, I felt it.  “What do you mean?” I ask.

“You -a-already-a-missed the first-a-miracle.  You-a- to -a- worried about the big -a- miracle and you are -a- missing all of -a- the -a-little ones.”

I’m lost, “What do you mean?”

“Time -a- you imbasile.  You -a- fight a long-a- time, You -a- get a more time than most yes.  That -a- is -a- the first -a-miracle!”

We sit in silence for a while.  I’m trying to let what she is saying sink in.  Trying to understand the depth of her thoughts.  I want to clarify so I ask, ” So what you are saying is that because I have been wanting, worrying, hoping, and praying for the big miracle that I have not been paying attention to the miracles that God has already granted in my life.  Including but not necessarily limited too more time with her than average.”

“Zyes, and time is-a- costly,”

I slowly nod my head in understanding.  “What’s your name by the way?”

“Isabella.”

“Well, thank you Isabella.  Thank you for some much needed perspective that I evidently really needed right now.”

Her expression softens and she says, “Come-a- now my-a- young-a- friend.  You -a- pray -a- with -a- me now. ”

I get up and move over to her and she grabs my hand with both of hers and begins.

“Dear -a- Father in -a- Heaven.  Please give -a- this -a- young man enough of -a- the strength to see your -a- miracles as you -a- give -a- them.  Hold -a- them all in your -a- grace and grant them a little -a- peace some -a-times.  He -a- is a good -a- young man,  help him as -a- you a see -a- fit.  In the name of the Father, the -a- Son, and the Holy spirit, Amen.

She gently squeezes my hand and says.

“you -a- get -a- back now.  You gone to long all -a- ready.”

With that I feel that I have been dismissed from my own private Catholic school.  I get up and go back inside and try to find my way back to where I am supposed to be.  As I walk I replay our journey in my mind and try to find how many places I probably have missed Gods hand in our lives.  It’s probably the same thing that Chester was talking about when he talked about providence.  I guess who ever said it was right.  “Sometimes we are to busy looking at the forest to see the trees.”  I don’t know if what Isabella said will change anything in my life.  I am still tired, but it will change the way I look at things.  What she said made me realize that even though I might not know it at the time, someone is standing with me and I am not alone.  For me that is worth more than anything.  So I will march on.  I will fight with what courage I have left and lead my warriors into battle no matter the odds.  I am not William Wallace but I have someone so much bigger on my side.

It’s funny how we tend to put life into little categories.  I suppose it’s our brains way of keeping it all straight, so when we need to recall it it’s easy to find.  The world’s biggest and fastest computer.  When you get to be my age there are something’s that you wish would not have been stored on your hard drive and some that you wish you could just hit the repeat button and have it keep playing over and over.  I have been through good times and bad and luckily survived both.  As I get older seems like there is a lot less good and a lot more of just passing time.  It’s just time.  No meaning, no measure of if it is good or bad,  just time passing on a clock.

When we are young we don’t usually think about things being perishable.  If you think about it everything we are, have, and think is perishable.  It has a date stamp on it that one day will come due.  We in essence will become obsolete.  Something better will come along, the fad of our life will be replaced with something.  We will no longer be the up and coming.  Our cars will lose their luster.  Our house will become old and get that stagnant smell of someone just passing time on a clock that has seen 876,000 revolutions of the hour hand.  That’s one hundred years of perishability ticking away one second, one minute, one hour, one day, one year, and on and on and on.

I have lived a good life.  I have done many things, seen many places, lived in small houses and large mansions, drove fast cars, and cruised in slow ones.  But most important I have loved one woman.  Her shelf life was up about 131,400 revolutions ago.  My clock just kept on ticking though.  Eight thousand seven hundred and sixty revolutions after I lost my love I decided that I didn’t need all of those fancy things in life and more than that every year from then on I would slowly give away everything that I  had until my perishability date had arrived.

I thought it would be easy.  I guess I didn’t realize how much crap a person can accumulate in eighty-six years.  It’s a lot, and very overwhelming at first.  I slowly thought out a system and eventually things started moving smoothly. Life’s memories passing through my fingers one piece at a time, Passed on to someone else, maybe even extending their date for a little while.  Here at the end some things have started to get interesting.  That last can of soup was interesting to eat when i had given away my last set of silverware the day before.  I haven’t showered or shaved since Wednesday because i gave away my razor and last towel on Tuesday.  This last week hasn’t been easy, but it most definitely has been fulfilling.  It’s interesting when you get to the end of all of your things how much we take for granted, and how when you understand their true value, it is so gratifying to give it to someone who desperately needs it.

So here i am sitting at this little cafe on the corner.  I just left the lawyer’s office where I signed the papers to donate my house to some organizations that helps people.  Before that I stopped by the bank and withdrew my last five thousand ten dollars and twenty-seven cents.  I am in my best suit (only one left), and am enjoying the last meal I will ever buy (as long as it doesn’t cost more than ten dollars and twenty-seven cents).  The suit I suppose I will be buried in, so I guess I’ll keep that. The five thousand, well, that’s next on the list.  Who to give it too.  There are several candidates I see.  There is what seems to be an out of work construction guy in one booth.  Got a sad look in his eyes.  Maybe it’s not money he needs.  He evidently has enough for breakfast. How about the elderly women at the bar, maybe,  she’s is dressed pretty nice though.  I really didn’t think this would be that hard.  I guess I didn’t think I would have to make all these judgements of people’s lives.  Who am I to judge what people need or don’t need.  I’m not God or even a shrink, who might know what’s in people’s mind.  Oh well, I guess I will just leave it in God’s hands and hope he points me in the right direction.  My waitress comes waddling over.  I use that term enduringly because she has got to be at least eight months pregnant.  She looks very tired but none the less in a very perky and cheerful mood.  She takes my order and moves on.  I see her move on down to the table that some people have just got up from.  I don’t mean to be staring but I am.  She cleans off the dirty dishes and then grabs the tip.  I expected her to just put it in her apron and move on, but she carefully counted it and organized it and put it away very neatly.  It must be Gods sign.  She was that careful with the money because she needed something. Something that was worth saving for, a crib, diapers who knows but you could see the intensity in her eyes, it was something important.  She brought my meal and it was great.  I sit there thinking of how I want to do this.  When you’re talking about this much money do you just leave it, Maybe write a note.  I don’t know.

I decide to write a note, I want her to know that it is for her to do with as she pleases, no strings attached.  So I start my note:  Dear Sara, (I know her name because she wrote it on the ticket),  I am leaving this money for you because I think there is something that you really have been saving for. Please take what you need and if there is any left please give it to someone else that might need something.  I signed it with the letter C.  I took out the fifty, one hundred-dollar bills and slid it under the one dollar and ten cents left from the ten and 27 cents I gave her for the meal.  I closed the flap on the little book they give you with the check and got up and left.  Just like that I was homeless and penniless.  I have given away everything I have.

I’m a curious gentleman , so I go across the street to a little park area where I can see in the windows of the cafe, and sit down on a bench there.  I want to see the look on her face when she finds it.  It doesn’t take long before she heads over to my table.  Just like before she cleans all the dishes first and then looks in the booklet.  She gets and odd look on her face as she reads the note.  I can see a slight shaking of her hands as she reads.  She slowly sits down in the booth and sets the note aside.  I see her pick up the money and start counting.  I can see a tear our two on her cheeks at about twenty and by the time she gets to fifty her shoulders are moving up and down and there are lots of tears.  She puts the money down and holds her head in her hands for a few minutes and then she takes a really deep breath as if to compose herself.  I think awe relief.  I did the right thing.  Then she did  curious thing.  She took all of the bills, five thousand and one dollars and folded them in half, then took the dime and slide it into her apron and then got up spoke to the manager on duty and ran out of the door and down the street.

I sat there for a moment and my curiosity got the best of me again.  I didn’t have anything to do anyway.  No place to go, so I thought I would just walk the way down the street that she ran.  I was rewarded a few blocks down when I see sitting on the steps of a row house three women hugging each other and crying their eyes out.  I’m still on the other side of the street, so I pick a step and sit down.  One hundred year old bones don’t like to go that far anyway. Pretty soon they all get up and do some more hugging and laughing and then my waitress bids them farewell and heads back toward the cafe.  Then the other two girls giggle and hug once more and then part ways.  One goes up the steps and the other starts across the street towards me.  I guess it is human nature to want to know what the outcome of our good deeds are.  But for some reason I really wanted to know what happened.  As the young woman got ready to pass in front of me I said miss if you wouldn’t mind indulging an old man of what was all that about.

She smiled at me and said “It is a long story.”  I said that is ok, I’ve got a lot of time.  She sat down beside me and started telling me their story.  She said that her sister, the one that went up the stairs has a baby named Jesse.  Jesse has a cancerous mass on his spinal column which is heartbreaking in and of itself.  Jesse needs surgery and the only place that does this specialized surgery is all the way across the country.  The hospital is willing to do the surgery for free, but they have to get Jesse there.  It is too far to drive him so they will have to fly him in a medevac plane and to do that it will cost five thousand seven hundred and twenty-seven dollars.  If you have ever noticed, old people tend to cry a lot, and I had tears getting ready to pour so before i couldn’t speak I said where are you going to get the money.  She said, “that’s the crazy thing.  Last night we got together and prayed for a miracle for Jesse.  We Prayed that God would take him in his hands and get him to where he needed to be.  The tears earlier were because Sara just got a huge tip that will take care of it.  Our prayers were answered.”  Without thinking i blurted out where are you going to get all of the money.  She kind of looked at me funny and said that the tip was for five thousand nine hundred and fifty-two dollars.  More than enough to cover it. I was a mass of tears at this point.  I thanked her for the great story and got up and slowly walked down the street.  I suddenly knew why Sara only put the dime in her apron.  On the way to the house she had taken nine hundred and fifty-one dollars of her tip money and added it to mine.  She wasn’t saving for herself.  She was saving for Jesse.

I walk a bit further and found another small park with a nice bench for sitting.  I sit down feeling like a very weary 100 year old man.  It’s my birthday today.  I decide that I need to write this story down it was too good to not share.

To whom it may concern:

If you are reading this story then that means that you have reached into my breast pocket of my suit and got it out.  If you have done that, then my clock has been vanquished.  I am sorry that you were the one that had to find me, but would you please share this story with someone.

If I would happen to have a tombstone would you please print on it “Died broke and Penniless, but with a full heart.”

Thank you:

R. E. Cnacetahi

Me and my four-year old went for a walk the other day and we were just shooting the breeze like any father and son might do.  Talking about rabbits and frogs and what we might do.  When out of the blue he asks me, “dad why is mom so grouchy when she gets home?”  I was kind of taken aback for a moment and didn’t know what so say, so I said, “well that’s a good question.  Let’s sit down here and talk about it.”  I knew trying to explain this to a four-year old was going to be difficult, so I had to come up with something good.

I thought for a few moments and then said, “You know that picture book with all the big trucks in it?”  He said, “ya I know it.”  I said, “In that book there is a gas truck right.”  He said, “Yep.”  I said, “What does the gas truck do?”  He thought for a minute and said, “Well it drives around and fills people’s gas tanks when they get empty.”  I said, “That’s right, and when the truck is empty what does it do?”  He said “well, it goes home to get filled back up again so it can go fill more tanks.”  I said “exactly right.  You see son, your mom is a teacher and she is very much like that gas truck.  She goes around every day and fills people up with love.  She helps them learn things, and makes them feel important, and just makes sure that they know that somebody cares about them.  But when the end of the day comes her tank is getting pretty empty and so what does she do.  She acts just like that gas truck and goes home to get filled back up with love.”  I asked him, “Who do you think are the lucky people who get to fill her back up?”  He thought for a minute and said, “Well I guess the only people who are at home and that would be me and you.”  I said, “You are exactly right.  Sometimes we have to fill someone up with love before they have enough to give us some back.”