Hello Friends:  Alan Here. FYI:  I’ve changed up Chemo Day from Tuesday to Wednesday so Misty and I can participate in a small group at church on every other Tuesday night.  When the opportunity to participate showed itself it was squarely on my chemo day and I went through an immediate problem solving exercise:

Should I…

  1. Paint Eyelids?
  2. Talk to former Pro Baseball players about “performance enhancing drugs” that could help.
  3. Talk to Strom Thurmond’s former staff members and learn secrets of success in spite of sleeping through meetings.

I'm falling asleep but I look awake!!!!

Does this even need a caption?

All these had good potential, but then I thought, Hey, let’s just move chemo to Wednesday.  This allows me to be as fresh as I get for this meeting tonight.  Woops.  I think I just took away lots of potential excuses for low-performance.  Oh well.

This week has been really OK.  I’ve been tired a lot.  The liver pain has been right on time and very similar to paste cycles.  It was a little more intense and I’m praying that it just means out with the old, in with the new.  Unwanted passengers get off the vehicle!!!

I keep having performance anxiety these days as I go to pick up the computer.  In fact, I’m not even sure right now what I’m writing.  And my mind wanders. As frequently is the case, its just wandered to Five Guys Cheeseburgers and Fries.  Really, if you haven’t gone there, you must.  Simple goodness.  Burgers and hand cut fries.  So I got out of the house by myself four days ago and ended up hungry and within sight of a Five Guys.  So I walked in there.  I don’t know about you, but some days I’ve got things prayed up and tucked away.  Other days I can be so cranky and critical.  I’d like to blame it on low-blood sugar, but I was seriously cranky while approaching the burger-dispensary.  There was ONE cashier and two ladies ahead of me.  Each of the ladies took more than six minutes to communicate their order. Yes, I timed it.  My face said it all.  “Can’t you just get your order in in a timely manner, Ma’am????”  Things were getting off to a bad start.

So it was my turn to order.  It took me 32 seconds to order and transact.  Yes, I timed it.  So I grabbed some roasted peanuts and sat down with my iced tea.  Nibbling on a few goober peas helped my attitude a little, but not much.  I’m sitting by myself and I’m just checking out the room.  To my left I see a couple bankers.  One had on really bad shoes.  (If you know me from business, you may know that I have rigid shoe requirements for business dress)  The guy with really bad shoes gets up to get a refill on his soda.  He’s got cerebral palsy.  The bad shoes with the suit were what he needed to be able to not slip around with his altered gait.  I’m feeling like a real JERK at about this point in my cheeseburger experience.  So I get my burger and bushel of fries and settle in to chow.   As I do, I notice a couple sit down right in front of me and they have a tiny baby.  Really cute kid.  Maybe 3 weeks old.  At this point, I’m pretty calloused to the sound of crying babies.  But it did occur to me that I’d probably have to struggle through my burger with the cries of this baby three feet away squalling for a bottle or something.  About the time such a selfish thought occurred, I noticed that the baby’s mom and dad were very quite.  In fact, they were not speaking.  They were signing to one another.  So mom and dad are deaf/hearing impaired, and baby is either really happy or understands that crying loud doesn’t get her anywhere with her parents.  They would be really glad and happy to be able to hear a squalling baby, wouldn’t they?

I started thinking, “Wow, God is trying to show and teach me something here.”  Too many things were happening at once and in a related fashion.  I’d love to let you know something profane…I mean profound that I was able to learn from this.  Other than “don’t be an A-Hole, you might not know the whole story” I didn’t really get anything strong out of this.  And I’m convinced that God was trying to show and teach me something.  God speaks to us a lot.  He has lots of ways and manners in which to give us His words.  In Five Guys I feel like I missed something He was trying to say to me.  I’ve seen how specifically loud God can communicate to us.  I’m guessing that at times God’s voice is intoned with higher volume than others, but I think the more telling variable is how ready out ears are.  When I’ve heard (clearly) what God has to say it’s been when I’ve prayed up my awareness, my defenses and defeated my desire to steer the bus.  It was an odd set of circumstances that progressed at Five Guys last week.  Don’t get me wrong;  the burger was its standard perfection of fresh ground cow parts a la flat grill.  The fries were likewise outstanding…bringing their earthy flavor to bear while surrounded by the flavor and shimmer of peanut oil and salt.  BUT, I feel that I missed something that day.  Maybe some conversation I was supposed to have.  Perhaps some insight I was supposed to pick up from my surroundings.

Yeah, I was feeling a little self-pity that day but I don’t think the message was “Hey, you could require 20 minutes to order a burger or you could have CP or you could be deaf.”   None of those are bad messages that I couldn’t be enriched to have learned, but I just don’t think this is whatever it was God wanted me to learn that day.  Sad thing is, that’s a great improvement over the days that I don’t even GET that His hand is around me and I need to be aware of it.

It’s up to us to have our equipment at ready.  Sure God CAN turn up the volume to the point that anyone can hear Him.  But that’s not his style is it?  If we are HAM radio operators looking for the valuable transmissions, I guess the squelch that we can control is our presence in the Word and consistency in prayer.  I know that my Five Guys episode was during a time that I was slack in my quiet time.  Wonder what all we’ve missed?

Tomorrow we start Round 13.  I’ve been really nervous walking into Chemo the last few rounds.  It’s just the old “the last dozen times I walked into this room, I got hit in the head with a billy stick”- syndrome.  The smell of slightly stale, slightly burnt coffee in the waiting room makes me want to turn and run (hopefully before vomiting on my shirt).  Monday (Feb 15) we’ll go for a new CT.  We’re praying that the good results reported from December 7 are repeated or eclipsed.  Oh, the waiting…

Let’s all try to find a quietness that at least finds us able to drive some considerate thoughts through our heads.  Let’s try to squelch our HAM(burger?) radio with strong prayer and scripture time so that we can hear what God is communicating to us.  Let’s NOT be sad or discouraged even if we know that we’ve missed reams of communications God has meant for us to pick up as treasures from Him.  God doesn’t give up though the evil one will try to make you believe that you’ve missed your chance.

OK.  I know that I’m supposed to be funnier than this.  I’ll work on some updates for the Jack LaLanne Turbo Leg-Breaker 5000 soon.  I’ve been advised that the recent Dubai Credit Crisis and Fed Seizure of my juicer is confusing for many of you.  For now, however, Misty and I are gonna watch some American Idol and relax.  Thanks for your prayers my friends.  God is good!!  Take care my friends,

Alan