Hard things...

On our way home from Lake Powell, David received a text that our next door neighbors (one of the elderly couples I take Monday meals to) had lost a granddaughter to drugs. This poor family has literally had one horrible thing after another. Don has been struggling with cancer (two kinds) and heart issues, his wife is in early Alzheimer's and with back and other issues where she is wheelchair limited, a daughter who came to take care of them and got breast cancer...and had another surgery this past week. Although the granddaughter didn't live here in our area, our Ward did the funeral for her yesterday. Just a sad, sad day for them.




Yesterday morning, I woke up ready to tackle the aftermath of our trip. There are plastic tubs filled with everything to be re-washed and put away. Everything hosed off from the red dirt. Unpacking is not nearly as fun as packing....




Then I got a phone call that BFF Brendalyn's husband Joe had been in a serious accident on Saturday while we were gone. He had actually gone with a group to our church's girl's camp property to clear more trees and make improvements, when a tree someone had cut fell on him. He's seriously injured- helicoptered to Provo (after a horrendous ambulance ride on the terrible rutted wilderness roads to get to a place where the helicopter could land.) He is in the ICU there- his back broken in 5-6 places, lots of ribs broken, lots of stitches and other injuries. They won't be able to fix his back with surgery so yesterday they put him in a turtle shell (body shell) so they could move him upright (he started getting fluid on the lungs.) He is in so much pain...it just breaks my heart for all of them. It will be a long recovery to a body that will never be the same. So in mourning here.....





Okay, since I'm on a roll of unhappy, my dear friend Elsa also had her second knee surgery yesterday. She'll be in the hospital for a few days, then go to the rehab place where Brandi will be her therapist. Elsa is AMAZING. Brandi's never seen anyone come out of surgery like her. I'm taking lunch Friday for Elsa and Brandi. Aunt Pat is also having knee surgery next week and I'm her rehab house! I'm going to get a stack of movies and we are chilling for a week. She can't go home...she has stairs.... so I'm lucky to have her come here.



Yesterday when I was taking dinner to Kay, a widow in our Ward and neighborhood, one of her neighbors (that I don't know but just wave to each week) was out weeding Kay's flower beds with the promise of coming back to plant flowers. I was touched. At the church, to see tables arranged with tablecloths and centerpieces and a kitchen full of food donated and lovingly prepared by people who didn't know the girl or even the family involved just hit my heart strings. Last night when Ben and Susie just showed up to clean the boat inside and out, after all the work they did for us at Powell, again, just filled me. The goodness of others is probably the best medicine shared. Yesterday in the middle of heartache, I just kept seeing amazing service circling around everyone. Two quotes come to mind-


Great opportunities to help others seldom come, but small ones surround us daily.



and....We are not put on this earth for ourselves, but are placed here for each other.

Well, it is time to go pick up kiddos for the day. My MIL has been in Hyde Park all week with her sister while we were in Powell and will come home today. Have lots of work to do. Life happens (changes) in a minute!