In which the Meridian learns that, Wow, he is Awesome!

I'm back "here," finally. I returned to Wichita on Saturday afternoon; then, Mrs. M. came down to visit and didn't leave until early Monday morning. So, like a student who's missed a week of classes, I've been asking, "Wudidimiss?" I've been finding out the answers to that on my own by reading blogs--alas, even though I am Awesome!, my blogging peers didn't see fit to cease blogging in my absence. The world goes on. Despite that fact, though, not only did lots of people continue to visit good old Blog Meridian, some of you have been kind enough to offer prayers and best wishes for my mother's recovery, and for that I'm most humbled and thankful. [insert your own standard observation about how odd and yet powerful is the blogosphere's ability to foster a sense of community, if not neighborliness]

Below the fold, a report on my mother and an explanation of the title of this post.

My mother continues to do well. I am old enough to remember a time when people who've had major (and some not-so-major) surgeries basically disappeared into a hospital for a week or so, being confined to bed for most of that time. I don't know how the fusing of vertebrae and the treatment of spinal stenosis ranks on the major-to-minor-surgery scale, but general anesthesia and a 10-inch-long scar down one's lower spinal column would indicate to me a fairly serious operation. Anyway, I'm still stunned that Mom was literally up and walking within hours of her surgery last Monday and that she needed no equipment at home for getting around. Just someone to change the dressing over her incision, to run errands, cook, and clean up after the new puppies she for some reason saw fit to adopt two weeks before her surgery. (I would say more about that last, but I've resolved, for now, not to speak ill of my physically-impaired mother's judgment. I will say, though, that it was fun to see Scruffy romp about with them.) Anyway, whereas before the surgery she had such pain in one of her legs that she had to walk bent over at the waist in order to be able to bear walking at all (which was becoming more and more difficult), now she has no pain at all in her leg. Now, she has to retrain her back muscles so that they'll allow her to straighten up again, and they are responding by spasming. As her surgeon told her and me, though, her operation is not the fix but what will make the fix possible. Mom says she knows that, that she's not going to allow this chance to get her life back again, as she puts it, to go to waste. Exercise and diet are ahead for her. She eats pretty well, so acquiring the discipline of exercise will be the major change in her life.

My father died when he was 42, so I know what it's like to experience the death of a parent. However, I've not so far had the experience of watching a parent grow old. I am already older than my father was when he died. Mom, though, will turn 65 next month, so she is going to mess around and give me that experience, and this past week I had a glimpse of what that might prove to be like in its emotional charge, if not in its specifics. Before I knew how mobile Mom was going to be, I had been mentally preparing myself for having to help her with tasks likely to leave both of us feeling embarrassed and undignified. As it turned out, she needed no help in getting to the toilet or in bathing or dressing herself, but the task of changing her dressing provided sufficiently undignified/embarrassing moments to make me thankful I didn't have to help her with those other tasks. It was enough to remind me again of just how powerful is the illusion that our parents, in some form or fashion, will Always Be There, no matter how old they (or their children) get. My father's death has prepared me, I think, for my mother's eventual death, but not for her getting older: a different matter entirely.

And now, the moment that you, if you've read this far, you've really wanted to have revealed to you: Why I am Awesome!

You know the Bible 100%!

 

Wow! You are awesome! You are a true Biblical scholar, not just a hearer but a personal reader! The books, the characters, the events, the verses - you know it all! You are fantastic!

Ultimate Bible Quiz
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The quiz, let me say, is half a joke: many of the questions' possible answers are meant to be funny rather than sort of right, and many of the questions themselves could be answered by the minimally-informed unreligious. And I'll be honest: on a couple of the questions, I had to guess. I can't imagine someone who would score lower than 50% on it. Knowing stuff about the Bible is most assuredly NOT the same as knowing the Bible, and the far larger issue is, of course, what the Bible's meaning(s) is/are. Those latter two, more important things are not things on which I'd dare declare myself "Awesome!"

Anyway.

Once I get caught up with school matters and my blog-reading, something more substantial will appear here. It's good to be back, though, and flattering to learn that even though the blog went dark last week, many of you kept returning to see if the light had come back on.


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Blogs, Blogging, Blogosphere, Parents, Health, Old age, Fused vertebrae, Stenosis, Silly internet quizzes, Bible, Knowledge