The Potential of the Human Spirit

 

Have you ever been in just the right place at just the right time so as to witness a moment that allowed you to see the potential of the human spirit?

 

I have experienced one of those moments, and as I sat speechless, I held the tenderness and intimacy of the moment in my hands even as the universe around me felt like it was expanding with explosions of possibilities for humanity.

 

I was allowed to see what we, as humans, are truly capable of.

 

Back in 2001, as we were nearing my parents’ 50th anniversary celebration, my mother slipped on the back steps and fell onto the patio.  She sustained a Traumatic Brain Injury and was hospitalized.  Once they thought she was out of danger, she went through this little dance of being sent to a rehab facility, having hallucinations, being sent back to the hospital where they worked on her, being sent back to rehab, having seizures, being sent back to the hospital where they checked her out some more.  It was discovered that she had a rather impressive subdural hematoma that required surgery.

 

My dad normally wouldn’t bother us about medical stuff.   But this was kind of a big deal, so when he said that maybe I might want to think about coming home, that told me all I needed to know.  My youngest son and I drove the 900 miles home.

 

I got up very early the next morning to go to the hospital with my dad.  He wanted to spend some time with mom before the surgery and to relieve my sister Marcie so she could go home and get some rest.  She was coming back later, along with the rest of the family, in time for mom’s surgery.

 

As I always do when I go to the hospital, I brought a book with me.  When my sister left, my dad took her place in the chair next to the bed.  After kissing my sleeping mother on the forehead and telling her that I was there and that I loved her–without waking her up–I made myself comfortable in a chair against the wall across from the foot of the bed.

 

I sat and read my book, peeking up slightly every now and then to see my dad holding my mom’s hand and cooing nearly inaudible words that sounded to be sweet, loving, and very soothing.  As the sun began filtering into the room, my mother started waking up.  They began having a slow, quiet conversation.  Dad explained to her where she was, what had happened, that she would be having surgery after while.  She seemed to understand.  It got very quiet.

 

We were all thinking the same thing, I think; there was no way to get around it.  The feeling that this might be their last time together was thick in the room.

 

My mom broke the silence.  “My mother was never proud of me,” she said.  “It didn’t matter how hard I tried, she was never satisfied.”  She sounded sad, almost broken, defeated.

 

My heart broke for her.  She was 78 years old, about to go into a very complicated surgery, facing the fight of her life, and this is what was on her mind.  How devastating must it have been to her as a child that she was still wrestling with it so many years later?

 

It got quiet again.

 

Again, my mother broke the silence.  “My mother didn’t want me to marry you, did you know that?”  My dad was two years younger than my mother and grandma said that mom was robbing the cradle.

 

My dad chuckled and said, “My mother didn’t want me to marry you either, remember?”  My dad came from a Polish Catholic family and my mother was neither Polish nor Catholic.

 

 

The way the sun started streaming into the room made it look like my parents were surrounded in a light all their own.  Although I was only feet from the bottom of the bed, it felt like I was watching from a great distance.  I felt far removed from the goings on in that room, like I was watching a movie.

 

“But here we are, Luce,” my dad continued, “fifty years later and we have this beautiful family.  I’m so proud of you, look what we made.  Fifty years and we’re still together.  We showed them, mama, didn’t we?  We sure showed them.”

 

I watched as a tear rolled down his cheek.  I watched as the lines on my mother’s forehead eased.  She got such a sweet, peaceful, satisfied smile on her face.  She closed her eyes and relaxed into the comfort of being surrounded by love.

 

I watched the two of them in that stream of light–their stream of light–and it was as if I could see little bits of pure love and thanks and caring and gratitude and peace and happiness flowing from his heart and surrounding hers until it seemed like they had just one heart between them, and it filled the room, and it was everything, and it was the only thing that mattered.

 

In that moment, there was no distance between them.  In that moment, they were connected at the deepest level by a love and a knowing that I hope every human being is lucky enough to experience at least once in their lifetime.  It felt so soft and peaceful, tender and true.

 

And then, suddenly, the whole image froze and shattered, falling to the floor.  Overwhelmed by my feelings of tenderness towards what I was witnessing, I had started crying and my sniffling  had broken the spell.

 

My dad turned towards me, and the look on his face calmly said, “Oh, Carol.  I’d forgotten you were here.  Come here, let me hold you.”   I swear to you, it felt like the arms of the Almighty Himself had wrapped around me holding me in pure joy and comforting me with the strength of His love, with the enormity of His love, with the sureness of His love.

 

I cried like a baby.

 

That morning was an experience unlike any I’d ever had before, nor do I expect to ever get another experience to equal it on this side of heaven.

 

So there it is.  Sometime after that, family members arrived.  My mother went to surgery.  We all sat and waited and told stories and laughed and cried and got quiet again.  When the doctor came in after the surgery was completed, he had good news.  I hugged him and thanked him for saving our mother.  There were still things she needed to teach me, and I still had so much love to spend on her.  She lived another eleven years, for which I am eternally grateful.

 

I saw my dad that day with his heart splayed open and exposed.  I saw him without the need for defenses.  I saw my mother’s heart raw and vulnerable, needing to be soothed.  I saw in them what God sees in each of us every day: our potential to love and soothe and care for and inspire joy in each other, our potential to share His love with our brothers and sisters to bless their lives, our potential to restore another person’s feelings of worth and remind them that they’re never alone.

 

Our words hold that power.  Each day we get another chance to choose how we use our words and the power they hold.  Each day I try to choose to use the power of my words for good.  Each day, I try to choose love.  Each day, I try to live up to the gifts my Father gave me and the lessons my parents taught me.

 

I believe that each time we choose love over hate, kindness over meanness,  or joy over discouragement, we win a little victory.

 

We light another candle in the darkness.

 

 

Do you have a moment from your life that stands out?  Feel free to share with us in the comments below.

 

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