A Picture of Friendship
It has a been a difficult time as of late. My mom went into the hospital last week. And when I drove down to see her, I found out that she was scheduled to have emergency surgery that Sunday. We are still waiting for results from the pathology lab, so no real prognosis yet. Just waiting. I'm driving back again this weekend, and I'm thinking this may become a pattern for a while.
There has been much texting and phone calling between me and my friends and between me and my mom's friends. I've long suspected that I pretty much have the best friends ever, but the proof has presented itself this past week. Texts like these keep popping on my phone:
"Thinking of you right now and praying for your mom."
"Can I bring you and your guys some dinner?"
"Tell me when you go to visit your mom, and I'll bring a basket of ready-made lunches and snacks over for the boys."
"How are you?"
If you have a friend who's going through some awful situation, and you're wondering what to say, feel free to copy the above.
Yesterday at work, I found a note from a co-worker on a sentence strip (do you know what a sentence strip is? It's that long piece of paper that PreK teachers use to create hats for kids. Also, they sometimes write sentences on it; it's the pink one in the photo) telling me that she had purchased some frozen meals for my family so I can leave town at any time and have one less worry for my family.
My co-worker picked out her son's favorites from Trader Joe's, figuring that my boys would like these as well.
My mom's friends have been bringing treats to the hospital, not for my mom to eat (because she can't eat anything right now), but so that she has something to offer to the nurses and other visitors. This kind of detail is important to my mom, and my heart breathes a little sigh of relief knowing that her friends know this.
During moments of crisis, I've heard people say, "I just don't know what to say," or "What should I do?"
"I'm thinking of you" and a meal are perfect.
Thank you, friends.
