Ahhhhh, Sleep!

White was on my mind this morning when I woke, took a breath, and felt no pain, and didn't knock myself out coughing.

White, like this mock orange blossom, white, like puffy clouds in a dark blue sky in summer, white, like cool bleached cotton that reflects the heat.

I pulled a favorite summer outfit from the closet, a long white cotton shirt and light tannish gold linen trousers to wear to church, feeling as though I'd had a reprieve from prison.

Yesterday, I needed no medication all day long. Of course I took the prescription stuff the doctor ordered, but not OTC antihistimines or cough suppressants or pain-killers. At midday, I swallowed a nutritional supplement that has quercetin, bromelain, and vitamin C -- something we used to suggest at the health food store for respiratory congestion, but that was all. At bedtime, I took some Advil Cold and Sinus, a dextromethorphan cough suppressant, and some doxylamine succinate (Unisom) ... and then read until I fell asleep. I woke twice to cough during the night, but the rest of the dark hours, I slept, and dreamed and dreamed and dreamed. When I would wake, I'd smile at having been able to sleep and doze off again.

This morning, I felt GOOD. Not a hundred percent, mind you, but GOOD.

Being able to sleep is vastly underrated until you find that you can't. Then you long for it as though it was food, or love, or money when you can't even afford a pair of JackInTheBox tacos. Now combine that with not being able to breathe normally, and you have a very sad existence. Thus, this morning, with both sleep and breathing, was like a national holiday and vacation plans and a bouquet of roses all in one.

In addition, I've been in touch by email with my mother's pastor, and it turns out that before he became a priest, he worked in long-term nursing care with a specialization in gerontology. He understands Alzheimer's victims, and he can minister to my mother even in her dementia -- he won't be hiding from her, hoping he's not called to help out. Indeed, he plans on picking her up and taking her to visit my sister -- he's not forgetting about her, either. And at the end of his email, he asked if there was anything he or the parish could do for me.

The nice dreams I had last night, the feeling of returning health this morning, and such incredible kindness -- there's nothing more I need here. God is good, and as this morning's first reading told, His ways are hidden, and inscrutable, but always make sense in the end. If all the grief of this summer was meant to lead up to my sister's spiritual needs being tended to, and my mother's spiritual needs being made known, and my realization again that living is about joy in existence -- why, then, the grief was nothing at all in comparison with the reward.