An overwhelming feeling of gratitude

 

A friend asked me this morning what my primary emotional state was at present.  Was it about the pain from my surgery, which is still quite intense?  Was it depression at not being able to do so many things I'd taken for granted?  Was it not being able to help my wife with routine housework?  After thinking about it for a while, I surprised him - and myself, for that matter - by realizing that my overwhelming feeling right now is gratitude.

I'm very grateful that I live in a country where access to top-quality health care is feasible, so long as one has the necessary financial resources to pay for it:  and, even if one doesn't, very often a plan can be made to sponsor treatment or offset the costs in some other way.  There are large parts of the world (including many in my old Third World stamping grounds) where this sort of treatment, for this sort of problem, simply would not be an option, and I'd be very unlikely to be able to get the necessary visas and funding to pay for it elsewhere.

I'm profoundly grateful for the generosity of my friends and readers, people like you.  I genuinely didn't think there'd be enough support to achieve my fundraising target of $50,000, but you came through like champions, and we reached it within eight days.  That's a very humbling thought, that so many of you were prepared to dig deep into your own pockets for little old me.

I'm also grateful that we have financial institutions who are prepared to risk their money on someone who's built up a good credit record.  My wife and I had planned to finance this surgery and subsequent operations in three ways.  A third would come from a fund-raiser (we hoped);  a third would come from a second mortgage on our home;  and a third would come from our existing assets - savings, investments, part of my gun collection, etc. - that we could cash out for this purpose.  The second mortgage took a while to arrange, and the interest rate is higher than we hoped to pay, but it came through a week before the surgery.  Its proceeds, along with those from our fundraiser, are now lodged safely in savings accounts, ready for use whenever we need them.

Not least, I'm grateful that so many of our local friends have shown willing to come by, visit with us, make sure we're OK and have everything we need, cook meals so that we don't have to prepare them ourselves, and so on.  They're all busy people, and we know we're an added burden on their time at present, but they've stepped up to the plate like champions.

So, you see, the pain (intrusive and unwanted as it is), depression and other negatives are simply unimportant compared to the many blessings we've been given.  My wife and I can only look around us and shake our heads in disbelief at how good God and our friends have been to us.  It renews in us a determination to be equally good neighbors to others as and when the need arises.  Our present situation would be a lot harder to deal with without such help.

It's also a helpful reminder to all of us to invest in our relationships during times when it's relatively easy to do so.  We've built up a very warm, friendly little network in north Texas, perhaps a couple of dozen people in all spread over several hundred square miles, and many of us have taken advantage of those friendships in the past.  Long may they be there for all of us!  If you haven't been fortunate enough to have built up such a network in the past, perhaps now would be a very good time to begin, so that when the need arises, it - and they - will be there for you, and vice versa.

So, yet again, thanks, dear friends.  We couldn't do this without you, and we remain very grateful to you all.  God bless.

Peter