Her teeth are sitting in the plastic cup beside her bed. Her one good eye is open but unfocused.   She will respond to a silly nickname spoken in love and it doesn’t have to be the same nickname twice; it is the love in your voice she hears and it is the love she responds to, then she is gone again.

The doctor gives her a good prognosis, providing she can survive the surgery. Her mind is not what it used to be, her body is frail despite a good constitution. We kissed her and loved on her and let the tears fall after they wheeled her out of the room.

He remembers walking home for lunch in grade school. She was never a good cook but she was smart enough to know that her little boy thought it was a grand treat to have biscuits with jelly for lunch….

Prayers are for “what ever the Creator has for her”…nothing more.  Now we wait.

He remembers the weekend he decided to run away…out of state to an outdoor rock concert.  He still laughs when he tells the story about how she made his father drive to Michigan to find him…needle in a haystack.  He went home after the concert…she was so angry but happy to have him home.

The minutes tick by, friends come out to sit with us.  It wasn’t too long ago that we sat in the same waiting room with those same friends for that friends’ mother…I guess turnabout is fair play after all.  There are smiles and jokes all around.

I update all the facebook family while we have time.

Time; this is when it runs at its’ slowest…waiting for news…good or bad.  It was only an hour and a half but I swear it felt like six.  I was thinking that I should have brought a hoodie or something, it is 95 degrees outside and cold in the waiting room.  Why is it always cold in the waiting rooms?

The nurse finally calls her name so that family will know.  A quick glance into her eyes tell us much and for the first time since we sat down our shoulders relax and we look into each others eyes, eyebrows raised to ask “good news?”.    He is a good surgeon they say, so we head to the next room to await our consultation.

She won’t remember anything, not the pain, not the hospital food, not the nurses names or faces, not the gentle hands of the surgeons.  We will, we will remember prayers answered and sighs breathed out and a bracing for the next phase of her life…however long that may be….