joy of nine9

Moments of Gratitude

I love Canadian weather with its four distinct seasons. The sun is still warm in the afternoon and the morning frost seems to leave the air feeling crisp and clean.

Although all the leaves have fallen, we are still surrounded by tall evergreen trees, with a stand of 30 pines along the creek. Flocks of geese fly  low over our land , an eerie honking sound reverberates even in the house. As I learn to let go of tension, of always being on my tip toes, constantly busy with a large family, I thank God that this healing can happen here, surrounded by acres of nature, on the edge of a tiny hamlet.

Pondering

On my other blog, themotherofnine.wordpress.com, I posted  a story which was triggered by a post prompt,Life and Death. What is so startling about this story is the freedom Christ gives all people.  Jesus respects our free will, even four-year old’s.

This is the story of Chandra, the young daughter of a good friend

Ultimately, there is a thin veil that separates life and death.

The following is a true story of a four-year old child, in a coma, following a serious car accident.

Chandra was still not conscious when she began to speak to her parents in the ICU. She spoke as if in a dream, describing a big room with two doors where she sat waiting with several other people.  She explained that  she had to decide which door she wanted to walk through.  A really nice man, dressed in white smiled at her and told her that she was completely free to walk through either door. One door would bring her back to her life on earth.  If she liked, she could across the room, take  the nice man’s hand and walk through the other door.

In the beginning, Chandra spoke weakly, in a disjointed manner insisting that the nice man loved her so much that she wanted to be with him. As the days passed, she spoke in a stronger voice and began asking her parents,

“Do you love me?”

When they assured Chandra that they loved her she answered,

“Wellll…I don’t know. I really want to be with him. Buttt…maybe I will come back”

The next couple of days were spent in an almost comical dialogue as Chandra asked if her siblings, grand parents and extended family all loved her. After each confirmation, she emerged slowly from her coma, answering in an ever more confidant voice,

“Maybe I will come back!”

Throughout the discussion, Chandra  described the other people in the room, casually mentioning two people who stood up and walked across the waiting room, walking through the second door with the nice man. One was a young guy, who looked just like her young uncle and another an old woman who was like her grandmother. Within minutes of Chandra’s announcements,  an elderly woman and a day later a young man died in the ICU.

For her parents, the most startling fact of this entire experience was that tiny Chandra could perhaps choose between two outfits her mother picked out or whether to have an apple or an orange for a snack just a week ago. On earth, she would not make any major life decisions until she was 18 years old. Yet she was deciding whether to live or die.