THE INNER WORKINGS...

And, if we're going to be honest, this is coming off of a not-so-great season for me. And so as I sit here by the phone, contemplating what I could have done (for example, gotten on the plane), I realize that the line between being grateful and being bitter can be very thin. I've vacillated between the two about four hundred times in the last two hours. I could choose bitter: why is this happening to them, why did the guy pull out right in front of them, why did God allow Dad to have a bad heart, why didn't I get on the plane... and a million more unanswerable questions. But I want to choose grateful. I need to choose grateful. I must choose grateful. It's just a little hard. Mostly it's hard because it's based on faith and not self-centered pity. I'm better at the pity thing than at faith.

So, here it goes. Lord, thank you. Thank you that Dad survived another heart attack. Thank you for the ways you work miracles in medicine, and that a tiny little piece of metal is helping the blood flow so that his heart can keep beating. Thank you for doctors that know how to insert tiny pieces of metal in arteries to keep blood flowing. Thank you for airbags and angels that surely protected Mom and Dad today. Thank you for allowing them to walk away from the accident. Thank you for putting them together in the car; that neither one was alone. Thank you for placing kind strangers around that helped pull Dad out of the car, that called the ambulance, that probably calmed everyone down. Thank you for sparing both Mom and Dad's lives. Because tonight I can sit on a futon a thousand miles away comforted that I still have earthly parents. That feels good. Really good. So thanks.