This blog site has never belonged to me. It wasn’t my idea, but came into existence early last summer through my daughter Linnea’s urging. I believe her idea was prompted by God, since he was looking into our future and saw Nate’s cancer. He knew we’d need a way to communicate with people who wanted daily updates on his health. Beyond that, the Lord saw the help it could be to readers (including me) who were struggling to get through other things.

www.GettingThroughThis.com has been a joint effort all along, first with Linnea, then her husband who set it up, followed by the Lord’s prompting of what to write each night. Others have contributed words and ideas, and you, the readers, have poured forth encouragement with your comments.

Today I gave some thought to the strong connection I feel with each reader. You and I, we are a blog-family, tied together in cyberspace by tentative words on a pretend page, all of which could disappear with one “delete” click. Without knowing many of you personally, I still feel an attachment. I believe this is partly because I’ve been praying for you from the beginning.

God has encouraged me to bring “the readers” to him every single day, praying different requests at different times. Although I can’t list all of your names, he knows every one of you intimately and makes my generalized prayers specific, according to what he knows each of you needs. And when one of you writes, “This post did something for me today,” I thank God for answered prayer.

When I read the comments left at the end of each post, it thrills me to see some of you interacting with each other, developing new cyberspace relationships separate from the one with me. I feel like a mother hen watching over her chicks, glad to see them getting along so well. We are an extended blog-family, not by blood but by adoption, not because we have to but because we want to.

The Lord sees far down our life pathways, knowing which of us is about to enter a season of sickness, death, unemployment, financial shortfalls or other stresses. Even while we’re reading the blog, he could be using it to prepare us for what’s just around the next corner. He knows exactly what’s about to crash into our lives.

Writing these words each night is a joy for me. As I listen throughout the day to hear what God will prompt me to write, I sometimes feel nervous, wondering as the hours pass what the subject will be. As evening approaches, if nothing has yet come to mind, I come to the edge of panic and must firmly remind myself its God’s blog, not mine. He’ll bring the words when the moment comes, just like he sent daily manna to the children of Israel in the wilderness. There was nothing for their tomorrows but plenty for their todays.

Nate’s hospital, Rush University Medical Center, has asked if they can re-post the “GettingThroughThis” blogs from the 42 days of Nate’s cancer. Posting three entries a week on the hospital’s web site, they have just put up Day #14. In this setting God is applying my prayers and the blog words to those who are in the middle of medical issues: pain, disappointment, disease, surgery, even death. The Lord knows what he’s doing.

Thank you, readers, for sharing this experience with me. None of us knows where it’s leading, but we can all be confident God is taking us there together, the whole bunch of us. We are family.
“But to do good and to communicate, forget not: for with such sacrifices God is well pleased.” (Hebrews 13:16)

As we age, we get inflexible, or at least that’s the perception of young people. We oldsters have a reputation for liking our own bathrooms, our own routines, our own way of doing things and our own beds. (When I gratefully crawled into mine after 17 nights away, I actually spoke to the bed.)

I don’t want to become unbending and am consciously trying to emulate the examples I know who live their lives with a great deal of give. Standing strong for moral beliefs is one thing, but being immovable on everything else results in a rigid life no one wants to be around. Even on the issue of right and wrong, listening to another point of view is a valuable (and attractive) M.O.

Nate was an example of someone who came to the end of his childhood fairly sure he knew the “right” way to do things. The way he figured it, GM was the place to buy cars, the Lutheran Church was the place to worship and Brooks Brothers was the place to shop. At the age of 17, he thought deviating from those and other standards translated into foolishness.

Then he left home for Northwestern University where life opened up new ways to view people, places and things. All of us look back and see signposts of importance marking our way. None of us leaves our family of origin (whether for college or another adventure) without quickly finding ourselves jamming a big post into the ground next to life’s path right then, which is why it’s important to leave home.

After passing that marker, Nate came to another big one when he met me. A signpost got mowed down when that happened, because opposites attract with extraordinary impact. Without that, we would have chosen opposite forks in the road.

So, if we were to end up together, Nate had to adapt. I didn’t drive a General Motors car, belong to the Lutheran Church or shop at Brooks Brothers. At that road marker he chose to step over many of his former beliefs, sizing them up as family traditions rather than life’s only way. Without that mental shift, he couldn’t have justified dating someone like me. With it, he could plant a new signpost and keep going.

That’s how life is for all of us. We grow, change and see things differently as time passes, hopefully practicing inclusivity rather than exclusivity. Looking back over 43 years since Nate and I met on a blind date, I see his life marked by a display of adaptability as he willingly rearranged the life markers he had once planned.

He grew into a fresh outlook in virtually every category including who he married, where he lived, whether or not he became a father, how many children he had, how he made money, how he spent it, and yes, what he drove, where he attended church and where he shopped. New points of view were not garnered grudgingly but came about with reflection and a consideration for the other fork in the road. But once he chose, he didn’t turn around.

This photo was taken on a Sunday afternoon in a tiny summer cottage with a roomful of lively children swirling nearby. (See below.)

To me it’s a picture of Nate’s adaptability. Had he lived longer, I believe he would never have stopped adapting. His response to terminal pancreatic cancer was proof of that. When that road sign appeared, he modified his point of view in a way that demonstrated new heights of flexibility, because it led to the most significant marker of his life: death.

As different as people’s lives are from one another, no set of signposts is identical, but we’ll all end at the same marker as Nate did. It might have a different size and shape, a different way of being planted next to the path, but we’ll all end there. Rather than it being a dead-end, however, it opens the way to the last post, eternity.

Nate won’t pass any more markers or be presented with any more demands for adaptability. He’s moved past the biggest and best landmark of them all into God’s prepared home, and he’s done traveling.

“Blessed is the man whose strength is in Thee, in whose heart are the highways to Zion.” (Psalm 84:5)

We first came together on a church committee 31 years ago, a group of young moms staffing the nursery during Sunday morning services. The committee met monthly to divvy up jobs, write a newsletter, discuss ideas and inspire each other to be good wives and mothers. Our nursing babies attended the committee meetings, too, most of whom are now grown with babies of their own.

But following an agenda was not all that happened at our meetings. Friendships were formed, and chit-chat included laughter and sometimes tears as we shared parenting struggles along with dessert. Years passed, and most of us left nursery duty to serve in other ways, but we still wanted to get together. That’s when our Club was officially formed. We were in our forties, zooming toward our fifties, and decided to name our group The Menopausal Mamas, or The M&M’s.

Anyone could join us, but they had to meet one of three requirements: 1) be over forty, 2) be in menopause, or 3) have a teenager. All three of those categories needed strong doses of female support, and on that basis, we came together.

In the beginning years we each brought hand work to Club, needlepoint, photo albums, art projects, mending. One balanced her check book. Another graded school papers. I used to do my ironing. As we worked, we talked. If someone arrived at Club in a quandary over something, she could count on the rest of us to prop her up with understanding and acceptance. Before long, she’d be laughing.

The M&M’s have come together to make banquet centerpieces, plan bridal showers and celebrate milestone birthdays. We’ve also spent time praying in one accord when problems needed more than discussion. Most of all we’ve gathered just to spend time together, enjoying the luxury of being ourselves in the company of long-term friends.

Nine of us became the “old faithful,” and together we’ve been through thick and thin. In our early meetings, we joked we’d be the ones to plan luncheons after each others’ funerals. The first lunch of this kind has now occurred when The M&M’s laid out a lavish buffet after Nate’s funeral. I’ll never forget the strength and steadiness with which they made that difficult day go as well as possible for me and our family.

My mom belonged to her own Club when I was growing up. They met monthly and started their group during World War I. They called themselves Purl Harder, since many of them were knitting (and purling) for service men after the attack on Pearl Harbor. I remember lying in bed listening to these women talk and laugh until the wee hours of the morning, wondering what in the world could be so entertaining to a bunch of old ladies. Now I know it’s simply a healthy way to release the pressure of being wives and mothers. Our kids have listened to the same kind of animated conversation from their beds during meetings of The M&M’s.

Women love to be with other women. When I used to tell Nate, “I have Club tonight…” he could have responded with, “What, again?” or in some other way discouraged me from going. After all, I was leaving him with homework time, bath time and bedtime on a work day. Instead he’d say, “Go ahead and go. It’s cheaper than a psychiatrist.”

On that score, he was right. When one of us has a problem, we bring it to Club where it can be talked through and solved. We share photos of weddings and grandchildren, marveling at the cycles of life. Although it gets more and more difficult to bring everyone together, we continue to meet.

Mom’s Club members have their get-togethers in heaven now, all but one, and she’s anxious to join them. In time, the M&M’s will go the same route. But for now, we’ll continue where we are, loving, laughing, celebrating and consuming  fabulous desserts!

“Strengthen the feeble hands, steady the knees that give way. Say to those with fearful hearts, ‘Be strong. Do not fear; your God will come’.” (Isaiah 35:3-4a)