Monday Monday

It rained during the night from late Sunday to early Monday. Suddenly she is afraid of rain. She says she didn’t sleep all night. She took two of her “sleeping pills” i.e., Tylenol PM. She fretted about the noise, the lights on at R’s house and imagined (hallucinations?) men working over on the back deck all night. She blamed most of her general distress on having to endure a “storm”. But there was no storm, just rain. No thunder, no lightening.

I think the problem is something else.

She has been in her trailer on the farm for a month now. She comments constantly and tells everyone about how wonderful it is to have family around all the time and she doesn’t have to cook because she has her pick of what to eat and who to eat it with every night. But, as I feared, even this is not enough now because there are periods of time, especially on Mondays and Tuesdays when she has to be alone for a few hours at a stretch. A pattern is emerging. She is pitiful and grumpy on Mondays. It’s a let down for her after having two or three days in a row of constant company. So, a month into this and she still is not fully satisfied. She needs more. The question is, what does she need and what is enough?

It’s no longer just the major transition of going from 24/7 companionship to being mostly by herself for four years. I think she is afraid. I just don’t know exactly what it is she fears. Fear of rain or being alone for short periods is irrational at first glance. If I peel back the layers over all this, I could make a wild guess that she is afraid to die, or, maybe she is afraid she will be alone when she dies. She will say in the most matter of fact rhetoric that she is ready to go be with her husband, that she has lived a good long life and she is tired. But when she had her last TIA, she admitted afterward to being scared to death. One who is truly not afraid to die, who knows for sure where she is going when she breathes her last, does not react with fear at the moment when death is possibly knocking.

I think she says what she believes everyone wants her to say but deep inside she both fears her mortality and, more precisely, her complete lack of control over something she does not really understand. She has carefully planned and executed every detail of her life for the past eight decades and now she is faced with having to relinquish herself to something she has no say so in.

I realize it’s hard to comprehend but if she could but surrender to the One who always has our best interest in hand, she would fear nothing at all anymore. There is no way anyone can help another grasp this peace that surpasses all understanding. It must come from the individual answering the call to listen, obey, and trust.

This is the ultimate “alone” experience but with the right understanding, there is no need to fear being alone, because, for one thing, you aren't.