Bed 22

February 13, 2010

The resident in bed 22 arrived in November 2009, believing he would die of leukemia perhaps by the end of the week. He is still with Sr. Wantabee visiting regularly. Today, February 12, 2010, he was a skin covered skeleton, too sick to open his eyes or acknowledge her presence.

His first reflections were reflections of gratitude. He reflected that it was good that his father had beat him and kicked him out in the streets when he was eight. It made him tough and taught him how to take care of himself. He used to walk the streets with his paper route and collect the kids for Sunday school by singing “I Come to the Garden Alone.” Sister Wantabee, do you know that song? Could you sing it?”

Sister Wantabee remembered back to Pat Boone singing the song on a record in the 60’s. She had it memorized. When she met her husband who had been raised in Africa, he had learned that album too. They sang the song together as they drove their children home from boarding school every quarter. In fact, the piano player of that song had gone to her church. Memories flooded her mind as she gently sang the song to Bed 22 who lay, enjoying his memories.

A crusty, seasoned steel worker who “lived life in the fast lane” joined hands with Sister Wantabee who lived her life sheltered by her faith and the two worshipped together in music.

Bed 22 is still with us and she visits him when on duty and he still teaches her.  She always sings “I Come to the Garden Alone.”  Their garden is planted in a care center. And the Lord always meets them.

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Dino

February 10, 2010

Today Sr. Wantabee visited with Mr. J. He suffers from a major stroke that left half his body paralyzed and he is wondering if life is worth living. As we have talked he shared that he was in a foster home at age five and got baptized twice, once in a gym and once in a church. Next he shared that it was good that he was taken from that home or he might have killed his “foster mother” for she held his hand over the stove until it blistered at age five and would send him to bed with his underwear over his head with the accident in his nose. He could never love a god who allowed that.
Sr. Wantabee agreed that “love” is a word we toss around too easily. “If you love me, you’ll sleep with me,” was her experience. It is hard for her to use the word “love” also. How does the word “trust” work? If the god-being is not Santa Clause, perhaps he, she or it understands that “love” is hard for us to say and accepts “trust.” We trust that he walks with us as broken people living in a broken world and is working to make thing right, even when we can’t see or understand. Since we do not do a very good job of it with wars and cruelty, the Christ figure had to come to start setting things straight. He thought it sounded like what his spiritual advisor had told him.
Today I asked him about his spiritual advisor, Jiyo? No, said he. It was Dino. Oh, Gino, said she. No, Dino, said he. Dino, like the piano player, said she. Yes, he works at the City Bar. Sigh, I had thought I was agreeing with the local pastor who visited the Gospel Mission he came from. Some days are humbling.

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Valentine

February 9, 2010

Yesterday Sr. Wantabee gave devotions to a memory care unit. She chose the story of Valentine. Ten little ole ladies lined the front row, ranging from age 101 to considerably younger (can 85 be considerably younger?), with two older men and a woman half coherent with her gerth spreading across a wheel chair.

We started by singing songs about love and heads started to nodd. 101 was already asleep on the couch. I quickly switched to the story. Around 300 AD a little girl was born blind in ancient Rome. She was thought to be cursed because of her limitation. Eyes opened. Also the emporer Claudius decided that soldiers could not be married because they would be thinking about their wife and children rather than war. A blind girl going for water and drunk soldiers celebrating the feast of Lupercalius in Rome. A drunk soldier grabbed the blind girl and said, who could love someone cursed by the gods and was going to whip her. (My arm went up in the air as this is a story dramatizeable.) Valentine, also at the water place, reached up and grabbed the soldier’s arm and stopped him. “This girl deserves to know that God loves her.” The soldier quickly replies, “What god? You’re not a Christian are you? You know what happens to them!” He takes the blind girl’s water jug and drops it so it is broken to pieces. Silence by all.

The girl Theodora, goes home to tell her father, the jailor, there is a god who could love her. Valentine goes to the woods to perform the marriage of a soldier to a maid, Lydia, in his household. Soldiers break up the wedding and arrest the servants of Valentine but leave him free and carry the servants to jail. Theodora and father are called to receive the people and close them up. Theodora’s job, as a blind daughter, was to carry a bag around that criminals dropped their valuables into – their “accursed crosses.”

Theodora runs to tell Valentine at the fountain. He ponders how to send a message to them. Could he write a note she would deliver? No, she would be killed if caught. But she could carry a verbal message. Valentine ponders about a token to show it was from him. Kids running in the square knock Theodora so that she spills red ink on some parchment for sale. Valentine’s question is answered. He takes the piece of red parchment and tears out hearts. (I take a piece of blue paper I found in a trash can and tear out a big blue heart.)

The hearts and messages are delivered but the news comes that the soldier and wife will fight the wolves in the collesium. Theodora tells Valentine. He goes to the jail and offers for a nobleman to enter the theatre in exchange for all the slaves of his household. Deal. As he enters the arena, he prays for Theodora to know God’s love and at that time her sight is returned and she sees the red heart with a glowing cross in it. SO, today we give hearts to friends a Valentine’s Day.

Hearts remind us of LOVE. I did an acrostic on LOVE. What does L stand for? Listening, leaning, loving. What words that start with O remind us of love? We came up with “open.” When people cross their arms and growl, we do not feel loved but when then run to us with open arms and hug us we feel loved. V is for visiting. When we visit with each other at meals we show love. E is for encouragement. When I say to to Ms 101, I believe in you, you can do it, she feels love.

St. Valentine’s Day: Love: listening, opening, visiting, encouraging. Reminding everyone, God loves you with all your baggage.

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Sr Hulda

February 8, 2010

SISTER HULDA
On Aug. 14, 2005 Sister Hulda celebrated her 50th year of consecration at Augustana Lutheran Church in Minneapolis, MN, with Sr. Ginger, Sr. Noreen, and Sr. Anne present to bring greetings from the Deaconess Community of the ELCA. In August 2006, I joined the staff of Augustana Lutheran church and heard about Sr. Hulda, the last remaining Deaconess in the Augustana Homes. I am now doing my internship in the Homes as Sr. Barbara.

Sister Hulda E. Simenson was born April 9, 1920, in Duluth, Minnesota to Joseph and Ellen (Thompson) Pfister but her mother died soon after and she was adopted by Edmund and Tora (Thompson) Simenson, her mother’s sister I am thinking. She was baptized at her mother’s bedside, confirmed in Mt. Morris Lutheran Church in Wantoma, WI in 1934, attended Waishara Normal School and then Lutheran Bible Institute in Minneapolis, graduating in 1943. For the young people reading, that is before Mona Lisa Smiles!

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