gratitude and fear

gratitude bestows reverence, allowing us to encounter everyday epiphanies,

those transcendent moments of awe that change forever

how we experience life and the world.

~ sarah ban breathnach

i picked up this wonderful book and have slowly been working my way through it.
one thousand gifts by ann voskamp. it is deeply rooted in christian faith and challenges you to look at the everyday gifts of your life, even during the trying times. i have a feeling, you may see many more quotes from this book in upcoming posts.

and it got me thinking, what would be on my list? not a bucket list of adventures to complete before the end, but experiences i enjoy every second of every day of every month of every year of my life...

too much of our lives are spent on dwelling on the difficult things. and some days, it feels as if those difficult things engulf us. i feel that at some points in time, we need to embrace those feelings, and revisit them every now and again. i truly believe that as we grow, we come back to those feelings and try to understand them and incorporate them into our lives. i think that is why sometimes, i feel the need to write about william and mom, not to dwell, but to try to understand...

then on saturday, i realized it and have been trying to understand. when we decided to invite dad to live with us, lots of thoughts and circumstances crossed my mind... keeping his medicine organized and out of the boys reach, making sure he didn't forget to eat, how to help the boys adjust, ways to get him to all of his doctors appointments, how tom and i would get time to ourselves...

but i didn't think of one thing, one very important thing...and even worse, i didn't have a plan on how to deal with it. i always handle the worst situations best when i have thought them through. even if they don't go as planned, i've at least considered a variety of scenarios and can handle the challenge,  no matter what happens.

dad closed on his house on friday morning. and since then, he has been noticeably feeling worse...his tremors are worse, he's a little paler, and he's complaining that his stomach is bothering him. so when he took a 3 hour nap on saturday morning, i was worried. i went in his room and he was laying there, so still...and that's when it hit me...the boys were in the living room watching a movie and tom was at the store. i was just checking his temperature, but those thoughts...it made me start thinking, what would the plan be if he needed to go to the hospital right away or even worse...

it was the one thing i hadn't thought of...
and now, it's one more thing sitting in the back of my mind...