Pandemic Parables: Relief
I am relieved about several things today in the hospital in Frederick, Maryland where I am working as a Resident Chaplain until the end of August.
For one thing, although the number of virus patients are going up, it is not a dramatic rise. As of this afternoon (Tuesday April 21st) we have twenty eight confirmed patients in isolation, with an additional two closeted awaiting results. And although we grieve the seventeen patients who have died, we rejoice for the twenty who have recovered from the virus, many who have already been released from the hospital.
I am also relieved that the hospital is saying that the COVID surge is now expected to peak a few weeks earlier than projected.
Apparently we could see that happening any time between now and the beginning of May.
Such good news!
On a far lighter note.
Far, far lighter...
I am relieved I haven’t been to Las Vegas recently or indeed ever.
Relieved that I haven’t forgotten about indiscretions that never happened on a trip that didn’t occur.
Let me explain.
One of the operators at the hospital called me this morning and said, a little hesitantly: “Chaplain Geraldine, your husband is on the phone.”
“I beg your pardon” I said, thinking I’d misheard.
“Your husband is on the phone”
But I don’t have a husband!” said I.
“That’s what I thought,” she said. “But there is a man who says he is your husband and wants to talk to you. I asked him if he meant the head of your department, Kay Myers. I know her given name, that she never uses, is Geraldine. But she always goes by Chaplain Myers, or Dr. Kay. I asked if that’s who he meant. But no. He says he wants to speak to you, Chaplain Geraldine, and that he is your husband.
I’m was a little confused by this point.
“I’ve never been married.” I said.
Then - hoping she would realize I was joking.
“Does he sound nice? Is he a good Christian man who is kind, intelligent, and has a great sense of
humor?”
“I’ll ask him” she said.
We both giggled like schoolgirls.
She never got to find out who he was or who he really wanted to speak to. When she reconnected to his line he had gone.
And although I racked my brain, and thought through all the drama of my misspent youth I am still completely certain that I’ve never been to Vegas...
This season is full of trauma and mystery, both.
There is another reason I’m relieved I’m working at the hospital during the Pandemic.
Toilet paper.
Seriously!
There is no shortage of that essential commodity within those healing walls. But the supply in my home was getting uncomfortably low.
I had begun to seriously ration my usage.
And by the time I got to the store in the evening after work the shelves glistened in their pristine emptiness.
What was a girl going to do?
I mentioned my predicament in a comment on a friend’s FB picture when I saw that they were nonchalantly propping up their computer against a twelve pack of plump rolls.
I committed the sin of envy.
Big time.
A friend in Tennessee offered to share her well-stocked supply. At first I was delighted until I realized what that would entail.
My friend would have to get out of her recently vacated sick bed, wade through her flooded back yard suited up with mask and gloves; and hover outside her local post office waiting until she would be the only one in there. Only then would she be able to send off the parcel she had laboriously packaged.
I would never let that happen!
I love her immensely for the offer. But no!
Still I had got to the point yesterday where I was in a staff rest room on the third floor, my assigned floor, and there, propped up against a water pipe, was a spare toilet roll.
I lusted.
Then I went into the isolation wing for my daily visit with the nurses. I bumped into the tall Jamaican cleaner who works there, the one with wonderfully kind eyes. He was exiting a supply cupboard. Curious, I peered into its depths.
It was a Corona virus Aladdin’s cave!
Next to gallons of disinfectant and sterile wipes were roll upon roll upon roll of domestically sized, individually packaged toilet paper.
I drooled.
I began to understand how the generation who came out of the Great Depression hoarded food, paper bags, jam jars.
The trauma of sustained lack had forever changed their habits.
I felt close to them.
Would I ever be able to think about toilet paper - loo roll as we say in England - in the same way?
Walking back to the Chaplains’ office I muttered a quick prayer.
“Lord, I really would like some rolls of toilet paper. And I’m too tired to go into more than one or two shops to find it, especially if I discover it was sold out hours ago. Lord. Help!”
Later that afternoon in our office one of the other Chaplain’s said:
“I went downstairs to the staff cafeteria and guess what they have started doing? They are helping out the staff who are having problems finding basics. They say they’ll have a range of things over the next few days. But for the moment they selling paper towels, bread, and toilet paper.”
Toilet paper!
I was down the stairs and along the endless corridor to the cafeteria almost before she had finished speaking.
There, indeed, in the entrance, on a newly erected shelf, nestled next to other goodies were loo rolls!
Glory!
Handing over 59 cents for each plump package was a joy, and a relief.
The Lord had heard my prayer.
And quickly.
Once again I knew, that in this season of trauma, mystery, and unanswered questions, God is faithful. Both in the small things as well as the large. As the scripture says, He will make a way where there seems to be no way.
He will provide.
There will be enough.
And when it comes to the uncertain future, that we all face, I hold onto with an iron grip, and speak out determinedly the promise in Jeremiah 29:11 “For I know the plans I have for you” declares the Lord, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you a hope and a future. “
And then I remember once again that one of the names of God is “El Shaddai,” which means the Great Breasted One, or The Comforter. God is Mother as well as Father.
Mothers care, protect, nurture, provide, and love fiercely.
And I had been mothered. Beautifully.
And I had the toilet rolls to prove it.
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