Stepping in the River

I’ve been much reminded, in these last days, of the old saying that we can never step in the same river twice.

In many ways, I am surrounded by people I’ve known most of my life, camped out in an intensive care unit, doing things I’ve done nearly forever.

Prayer. Listening. Straightening sheets. Talking with doctors. Feeding people.

It is a river old and deep for me.

In other ways, I have joined the cast of Steel Magnolias!

Women, and a couple of very kind men, many of us grandparents, doing what needs to get done, each in our own way and yet all together.

Another river old and deep, yet also wider, with room for more travelers.

It’s a filter thing, really.

Just as the metaphorical water moves, leaving the river ever new, our perceptions keep changing because we see and hear and feel through our ever-increasing experiences, letting new things in and, sometimes, clearing a few  more out.

My friend is doing better each day, which is the biggest part of what’s getting through my filters at the moment.

I’m glad to mostly filter out the feedback from swollen feet and restless nights and the predictable consequences of a couple of things I probably shouldn’t have eaten.

Today, though, it’s time to listen at least a bit to those messages, too. I’m pretty tired.

It’s feet up for me until the “night shift” starts at the hospital. Well, mostly!

We still need laundry and food and more frozen water!

Not to mention time for healing energy and prayer.

For my friend, certainly.

For the people of Mexico in the face of this latest earthquake.

For the people in the path of more hurricanes.

For the “guy in the red hat” I met at the hospital. His wife did not survive an injury similar to my friend’s. Last night and today, six people scattered across the country received life saving organ donations from a mom in her 30’s.

These stories, and so many others, changing the river we all share. Which is, perhaps, a thought we need to cling to more and more consciously.

That, and hope.