The power of a single prayer.

I am absolutely horrible about updating my blog. It’s part of my amazing ability to procrastinate until my feelings become so overwhelmed that I must sit down and write…something. This would also explain why on some posts it becomes disjointed at times until I can edit, or not, and try to convey a particular mindset. Today, I am simply overwhelmed with feelings of sadness, loneliness and joy, all combined. I feel them all with every passing second. That alone is sending a million thoughts racing through my head and it’s becoming difficult to just grasp one of them. I am sure that by the end of today, I will be in tears simply because I won’t know of any other way to release the feelings.

Not that crying is a bad thing for one to do. It’s just rare from me, or at least it used to be. Now it’s the so called norm. Granted, I have watched countless videos this morning that have left me in tears because of the depth of emotion it has stirred in my soul, but I cannot blame the videos for the feelings I have. One video in particular made me watch in horror and then, in a split second, I was crying tears of happiness. A woman, pulled from her car that had sank in a torrential rain, yet when the car was pulled from the water every single window was up, just as they had been when the car sank. I, through my faith alone, know with every fiber of my being that God himself was there in that horrendous moment. He is the one that brought angels, in the form of good Samaritans, to rescue this woman. It was not her time to leave this earth that day. Plain and simple. It brought me back to an incident that I went through this weekend.

I have shared this with only a couple of people. My life was spared and I know that whatever my mission in life is, it has not been completed yet. The day was a normal one, in the sense that nothing out of the order had happened. I kept procrastinating about going to a particular store because I didn’t want to deal with the hassle of weekend traffic in North Austin. Finally, I determined that I could no longer put off what I needed to do. I exited from the interstate and made the turn to go in the back way to the store, noticing flashing lights at the top of the hill at the entrance to the back way. I made a turn into the center lane and turned into a shopping center so that I could make my way to the regular entrance. I had no issues and was surprised to get in and out of the store in a relatively short amount of time…when one is surrounded by people shopping for the upcoming holidays. I ended up being in the store for about 30 minutes.

Having once worked emergency services, I knew I was taking a chance with exiting out the way I had hoped to come in. A wrecker was on scene and there were less emergency vehicles, so I was completely okay with waiting for the Officer directing traffic to motion for us to move through. When I pulled out and around the accident, there was another police officer behind me. I’m sure he had fulfilled his duties on scene and I said a silent Thank You for whatever work he had completed. As I was coming up to the green traffic light, doing the posted speed limit of 45, I notice a vehicle headed the opposite direction. Since I had the green light, like any other driver, I was still driving the speed limit and about to cross into the intersection. It was at THAT moment I realized the other driver was doing a much faster speed than I and they were turning across my path, going against the red signal in the turn lane.

You hear the expression that some say, the one about how their lives flashed before their eyes? I now understand that. In a split second, everything in my life flashed before me. My second thought was that this was going to hurt. *Quick side note* I have taken countless defensive driving courses throughout my life. I know how to avoid accidents when possible, how to handle a skid in both wet and snow conditions. I’ve nurtured those lessons and know that most accidents can be avoided, not all, but most. – I knew that if I did NOT turn my car to the left that we WOULD hit head on. I slammed on the brakes, the ABS kicked in and I jerked the steering wheel as hard as I could to my left, praying silently that I could avoid this and that there would be no phone calls made to my family members. As my SUV made that sudden sharp left turn at approximately 45 miles per hour, I felt a sensation in a vehicle I have never felt before and one I hope to never experience again. I felt the passenger side of our Traverse begin to LIFT away from the road. Determined to do anything I could and quickly resigning myself to the fact that I was about to experience a roll-over, I let off the brake, grasped the steering wheel tighter and simply prayed, “Please God. Not today. Not this way. I have a daughter that needs me. Don’t let my husband get THAT phone call.” I knew that even if I rolled, I would still stand a better chance of survival, than if I had hit the other vehicle head on.

This is where I know I was not alone in my vehicle. It stayed upright. The police officer behind me, who witnessed the entire scene that felt like an eternity, but in reality was maybe 10-15 seconds in its entirety, when my car came to a stop he rushed up to check on me, to make sure that I was okay even though there was “accident” scene. I never took my hands off the steering wheel. I would have lost it if I did. I assured him that I was okay. Shook up and I knew I’d be sore from the seat belt locking, but I was okay. I just needed to pull off the road and collect myself. I was told by the officer that he witnessed my SUV lift off the ground and then he said just as quickly he watched it set back down. How he had NO plausible explanation for what he saw, how he had seen smaller SUV’s just continue with the momentum they had and that, in reality, my car SHOULD have rolled. He’s right. It should have. But, while I felt the car lift up, in the next moment, I felt this massive weight on the right side of the Traverse and THAT is when it set itself back down. As I screamed that prayer in my head…that is when my SUV…just…set down.

I’m positive that I experienced a true Divine Intervention. There IS no other way to explain between what SHOULD have happened and what DID happen. I have my faith, I know that God is real, that Angels are real and I know that there ARE answered prayers. I couldn’t speak much to the officer. I was concentrating on not going into shock. Calming myself down. And then, just as suddenly, I WAS calm and I felt a presence with me. I came home and I’ve just marinated in the events of this weekend, letting the emotions wash through me and just being eternally grateful that my life was spared. I did jokingly say that if a human’s life is measured in cats’ nine lives, I had run through 7 of them in that one incident. That is how I deal with horrendous incidents…dark humor.

So, whatever I need to do in this life, it is not completed yet. I still have work to do here. I have just one more story to add to my testimony about the unfailing love and grace of God in my life. 

How my dogs have taught me to be happy

I had a rough day yesterday, as evidenced by the blog posting. Today, though, is a new day that is ready for the taking. Which reminds me that I not only should take something from the day, but I should also give something. A hug, words of encouragement, a laugh. Something to make someone else have a good thing in their day, even if it’s not the best day for them either.

My dogs serve as constant reminders that the little things are what is most important in this life. It isn’t money, fame, nice things or whatever else. Yes, money can buy things that can make you happy, but it doesn’t actually result in happiness from within. Let’s talk about Ash for a moment and I’ll prove my point.

Ash is the first Siberian Husky that we rescued. Now when I say that we rescued him, I mean that we gave him a home and we found him from a wonderful Siberian Husky rescue group in Tennessee. I called and ended up talking Husky stuff with a woman named Shana. We agreed that I could come down and see him and bring my other Sibe, Tiberius, with me. I knew that as much as I had fallen in love with Ash just from his picture, that if him and Tiberius didn’t get along, we could never give him the home he so deserved. Within the week I was making a three hour drive one way to go see Ash.

He was beautiful. Scared to death, scarred by abuse and he shook like a leaf. Shana had to pull him out of the crate that he was in so that we could try to pet him. After a little bit, we decided to introduce Ash and Tiberius, in a more neutral setting. Outside…where there were no crates, no other dogs and it was a territory that neither one of them could claim as their own. I almost did a backflip. You would have thought that the two of them came from the same litter they got along so well. We then took them inside where they proceeded to run, play and romp like puppies. I filled out the paperwork, signed the agreement about having him neutered, microchipped and acknowledgement that if for whatever reason we were unable to care for him, that we would contact them and return him until such time that we could bring him back or have him rehomed if the circumstances were critical.

That was almost three years ago. I have had the absolute pleasure watching Ash learn how to be a dog, and more importantly, how to trust. It’s been a long journey, but he has made such a turn around! He still sometimes hides if someone comes into the home that he hasn’t met before, but he will now approach them and at least sniff and possibly allow them to pet him before he decides if he’s going to hide, lie down somewhere or follow them around cause they are his new friend. He found his voice and uses it daily now, where at first he would cower in fear that he was going to be hit when he first started making sounds around us. So, every time he would make a sound, we began to praise him and make a big deal out of it, loving on him and trying to get him to do it again. It worked. He has the deepest voice and I now lovingly call him my grumpy old man when he talks to us. He still wants to be petted and loved on when he talks and we are more than happy to do it.

He is hilarious! We can walk somewhere near him, say “Yay!” and raise our arms up and he immediately jumps up, runs to us and jumps with his front paws out in a similar pose and smiles. He’ll even talk when he lands back on the floor…which starts the process all over again. He pants and he smiles and he turns in circles and he makes me laugh. My husband has a game called “Monster” that he plays and Ash LOVES it. His daddy will grab a blanket, run down the hallway, hide in a corner and cover himself with the blanket. He will then raise his arms up and make ghost sounds while shuffling down the hallway…and Ash runs at him, jumps up on him and tries to pull the blanket from him…all while talking in his deep voice as if saying, “Hey! Let my daddy out of there!” Pat also plays “Monkey” with him, where he will get on his knees in the floor and raise up and start making orangutan noises and beating his chest. Ash will jump all around him, talking and then nip at his ankles or his back and sometimes his arm, but he never ever bites down to hurt him. And if he does accidentally do something to you that hurts and you say, “ow”, then he immediately stops and will lick you. It’s his way of apologizing…and it’s adorable.

However; the most adorable of all is his love of squeaky toys. I don’t care what it is, if it has a squeaker inside it, it is Ash’s. Every time we get paid, I will buy three new toys that squeak and bring them home for him. I’ll remove the tags and give it one squeeze and you can hear his heavy paws running from wherever so he can get to me. I give him one at a time and the others don’t get introduced until he has killed the other one. That first toy is usually all squeaked out within five minutes. He will gingerly take it in his mouth, turn around, run to hide and you can hear that toy squeaking with everything it’s got! Ash will carry it around with him to different parts of the house and squeak there. If it’s dinner time or potty time…that toy goes with him everywhere…and if one of the other dogs tries to take it, he will growl at them…he never fights over it, but he will growl…and that’s usually enough. And I laugh and giggle every single time. He LOVES the squeaky toys. I’ve been told it’s a waste of money and my husband and I counter that it most definitely is NOT a waste of money. It makes Ash happy…and since he is our happy boy that likes to share his happys with everyone…we’ll buy stock in the squeaky toy company for the rest of his happy life here.

It’s the little things. A dogs grin, their unconditional love and how they love certain things that have absolutely no value to anyone else…but it makes them happy. And that makes me happy.

And THAT is all the difference in this life.

Be happy!

Even the strongest need rest.

As I sit here and wipe the tears from my eyes, I wonder when I truly began to shut the world out, and to constantly protect myself. And then I realize, that I have always done so, since a child. I didn’t want to be hurt, I didn’t want to feel, I didn’t want anything…including living my life. Most important at that point and still today…I just don’t want to FEEL.

It’s extremely difficult to put into words exactly what I mean by that. I carry so much, all the time, and then I have those days where everything will put me in tears. Because it’s exhausting carrying it all, every second…of every day. Today is that day. Today is when I just want to be left alone, to just lick the wounds, pull away and just breathe, waiting for night to fall, so I can go to sleep and leave today behind.

A single tear runs down,

Thoughts race…

Everything,

Nothing,

Pain…

A crushing existence,

Shouldering everything,

Sharing nothing.

Caring too much,

Yet hated,

So much more than she can ever care.

Pointless worry,

Unable to stop.

Unable to breathe,

Keep the armor on,

Words as weapons,

Always ready,

Battle never stops.

Her own demons hiding…

Waiting for that moment…

Weakness.

Like a Spartan warrior,

Hunker down, shield up,

Wait for the onslaught,

Resting only briefly.

The next battle begins.

-          D. Bunch