The pieces shattered on the kitchen tile. Reaching down I knew immediately the phone was damaged beyond use. A heavy breath while gathering up the casing, it seemed so insignificant, even though my normal had just changed.
Earlier that day I sat as a young mother shared with me her pain. Her normal was changing too. Cancer had taken a toll on her body and her life in scarring, demoralizing ways. Now tubes and wires hung from her limbs, and the absence of skin and roundness remind her of the stripping of her motherhood. So much of her now distorted that her young child no longer snuggled or climbed on her, but cowers on the hospital chair looking out the hospital window.
"I want to go back to normal. At home, as a mom, with my husband and child. With the normal routine, the normal go to work and pick up the house, normal." She wiped her tears with a semblance of a squashed tissue. Her brown hair falling out, matted to the pillow and bedding where she lay. A stabbing pain of empathy hits me as I sit, shrouded in locks of long hair, seemingly inappropriate for the setting. I am embarrassed by my small problems.
As I pray before bed I thank God for the profound reminder. I am blessed to be living in my normal. My phone breaking, or the toilet clogging is insignificant "normal", day-to-day blessed normal. All in the scope of a normal life. No cancer. No barriers to hugging my children. No hospital beeping and wiring and needles to interrupt my day.
I am grateful today for normal. And for the reminder that normal is amazing.
