perspective.

Live each season as it passes.

~Thoreau~

Our strength grows out of our weakness.

~Emerson~

I've not updated in quite a while, but I've been keeping pretty busy lately. Overall, things are okay. I feel very up and down, but I think that's probably normal. I struggle a lot with feeling overwhelmed with the whole situation...I recently wrote Jesse that the hardest thing for me is that it's so easy to become overwhelmed and let emotions take over and just get caught up in feeling sad or hopeless. It's amazing how quickly I can go from feeling fine one moment, and then completely weighed down and inundated with emotion after letting my thoughts stray to how much I miss him...being angry that he hasn't called lately...being worried about his safety...feeling frustrated that "I" have to do "everything" at home...wondering about how he's really feeling... Tears come easily these days. And at that point it's almost like I feel stuck there in that emotion and at times I have such a hard time getting out of it. Okay...I'm not going to bemoan the fact that I'm feeling this way by writing a whole lot more about it, but I truly do appreciate prayer. One good thing about this is that I am continually reminded how weak I am, and that I need to remember that His strength is sufficient. Mine never will be no matter how hard I try to convince myself.

A little over a month ago, an eighth-grade teacher at my school was life-flighted to the hospital after breaking his back. Obviously, this was something that would be very tragic but there is more to the story than just an injury. A friend called 911 and reported that Bret was unable to feel his legs after a fall down 17 steps. The truth came about about a week afterwards that that "friend" had been driving while intoxicated (Bret was a passenger in the back seat), wrecked his car, and tried to cover up the accident by removing an injured man from the scene and having a friend tow the wrecked car and hide it under a tarp in a garage. The young men involved in the accident then transported Bret to an apartment, pulled him up 17 stairs, and refused to call 911 until Bret agreed to "go with" the story that they had fabricated about a fall.

This is definitely sounding tragic, but the best part of the story is that the injured man in the story is a Christian who is leaning on God throughout all of this. Bret had excruciating pain, back surgery, and is now learning how to live life as a paraplegic, but he is trusting in God, witnessing to others in his rehab clinic, and giving thanks despite the trials he faces. He is an inspiration to say the least. Please take a moment to pray for Bret and his fiancee, Amy. Visit their Caring Bridge site for an awesome journal entry and for more information on his story.

It definitely puts my present "sufferings" into perspective. I am blessed.