Travels

The GPS on my car will “create” a road where before none existed if you drive in an unmarked area often enough. It has become a visual history of sorts of places we’ve frequented lately: the new road by the new big store, the new connector road near our home, the huge parking lot next to the soccer practice fields. And most recently, a hook-shaped road just north of a local hospital.

The hospice house my dad lived in until he passed away was just north of that hospital and relatively new, so we introduced it to our GPS. It was a 22 minute drive to get to him, and we visited often in those final days, the commute longer if we timed it poorly and joined the commuters’ congestion.

The drive there was usually harder than the drive home. Several times I blared music to pump me up, to energize me for the task of cheerfully visiting someone so near death. On a few drives I allowed myself to consider the inevitable, and my vision clouded with tears.

So much suffering, death, loss, grief. Pain passed around like an unwanted party favor.

In those dark days, I felt God’s presence, his loving arms reaching out to me, sleep sweet and filled with good dreams of my Dad. God was there with me in the pain and I am so grateful for His abiding love and presence.

The raw edge of loss isn’t as sharp as it was. Time in its relentlessness has a way of wearing that down a bit. New needs arise, pressing matters demand our attention, and somehow life continues even if it seems unreasonable.

I saw that hook-shaped road on my GPS last weekend as I drove with my boys. We had walked a local farmer’s market, found some delicious (outrageously-priced) treats as we wandered the stalls, admiring early produce, all the babies, and so many furry companions. We took those treats and drove a bit farther to the hospital, the newly-formed route revealed on my GPS.

Our oldest daughter is expecting our first grandbaby but her water broke ten days ago at 31 weeks. She was closely monitored, comfortable and baking babe as long as possible in the high risk maternity ward of the hospital next door to the hospice facility.

Driving to visit her I was struck with the beauty of the cycles of life.

Where there was once so much pain, we are now filled with hope and promise. The same drive is now filled with daydreams of teeny tiny toes, little hands wrapped around my finger, the cry of a baby filling a quiet space.

And so we waited with phones on the nightstand, the ringer turned up, waiting for a call. It came two mornings ago, and a rushed trip to the hospital- prayers sent heavenward as white knuckles gripped the steering wheel, a clear road ahead and so very many miles over the speed limit.

My daughter delivered our first grandchild and I made it to the delivery room to hold her head forward, to encourage her, to witness the awesome and amazing blessing of birth. Their sweet little girl came into this world exactly eight weeks and one hour after my dad died. I was holding his hand when he took his last breath, and I was in the room with our granddaughter when she breathed her first, less than a quarter of a mile away from where my dad died.

I am so grateful for this season, for the chance to celebrate new life, to feel God’s love so tangibly when I look at her (no snuggles yet, she’s a little too little), to feel hopeful for the future and all the fun we’ll have together.

I can’t predict all the places we’ll explore, all the new marks we’ll make on my GPS, but I know that regardless of where life takes me, God will always be with me, holding all my tears in a bottle, celebrating all my joys along with me. With Him, I will ride.