Like a Hangnail . . .

There are days that I'm just plain tired of having a concussion.  Like yesterday when I was already stuttering by 10:00 a.m. after a full night's sleep.  Or in church today where I was wearing sunglasses for like the 12th Sunday in a row because of the lights.  So this afternoon I gathered perspective.  Annie and I stopped on our walk at my friend Jana's house.  Jana has a brain tumor.  She's had it operated on three times.  She needs another operation.  The doctors won't schedule it "until" . . . and "until" is a very scary word because that means something has gone very wrong.

We sat in Jana's living room and went over the shared symptoms:  "TIred?"  Check.  "Stuttering?"  Check.  "Missing words?"  Check.  "Worse by Friday?"  Always.  "Light sensitive?"  Mmmhmmm.  "Memory?"  Sometimes.  Empathy was established.

Then Jana began to share what radiation has done to her eyesight.  She used to be my lending library and we read all the same books.  Only I can still read.  And she has more diagnosis than I have toes.  Her body no longer functions as it once did.  Nothing in mine is broken.  And she takes more pills in a day than I take in a week and one of them is bigger than all my pills put together.  And yet her faith does not waver.  She serves a big God. 

She has a brain tumor.  Really, I just have a hangnail . . .