A couple months ago, I got a knock on my door. It was a God knock … an unexpected knock full of many blessings. That very week, we had to change our insurance, making our income tighter. Finances, luckily, have never been an issue for us. God has always provided and taught us, but I also give the credit to my parents teaching me early about money and of course Dave Ramsey.
With a tighter income, that meant less money going into savings and it would take longer to get a bigger vehicle. My car (actually, Brad’s car now) is getting old and falling apart, plus we would like to add to our little family and my little car will not hold much more.
Behind that knock was my elderly neighbor. She needed a new worker to come and clean her house. She is in her late eighties along with her husband. Her husband, Herb, is not doing very well and is now on hospice. This flexible, part time job was perfect for my family. Did not have to drive anywhere, flexible hours and great pay for cleaning. I thought that this would be a simple job in which I could earn extra money for our ‘car fund’. The money has been a blessing, but it has not been the biggest.
When I am old, I want to be like them. Norma is so sweet, always talking about how ‘messy’ her house is and how much junk they have. Her house is always neat and their closets are half full … still have not found all this junk she has been talking about. I love watching her make her grocery list, figure out what she is going to cook for Herb and taking her to the store to shop. One of my favorite things is when she makes the beds. She always talks about how hard it is to make Herbs hospital bed, and it is hard! But she is so careful, the blankets have to be a particular length and no wrinkles at all. Herbs lungs are failing so he spends a lot of time in bed, taking multiple naps. She is so faithful, I have no idea how many times she makes that bed. I remember one day I helped make the bed. About ten minutes later, Herb was back in bed. I would have been so upset with Brad if he did that, but Norma did not even blink.
Herb struggles with every breath, but every breath, he is smiling and so grateful to God. He knows he is dying, and he is fine with it. He is so pleasant, always calls me ‘pretty girl’ and always wants to know how Joanna is doing. I love his smile and his routine. He eats the same cereal for breakfast every morning after thanking God for it first. He reads his paper, then goes into his office and reads the Bible on the computer. He does not stay awake for very long and is back in bed asleep. But I love how every morning before he gets out of bed, he thanks God in a quiet voice for the day.
A few days ago, I stomped over to their house. That morning, Brad and I had lots of things to do and all Brad seemed to talk about was going to the coffee shop. I basically got mad at Brad and told him that he a message to write that morning and two egg hunts to get in order and that all he was concerned about was coffee! 9:30am hit and I was next door. I walked in and Norma was upset with Herb. We were making the beds and she started talking about how Herb was complaining that he did not get enough food for breakfast. I told her about Brad wanting coffee, then we both looked at each other and just laughed. It was a good reminder that no matter how long Brad and I are married and how old we are, we will have those times when we disagree. It was such a little thing, we both realized how silly we were and then went back to our work.
I love going over to their house, it is a chance to learn. I hope I continue to learn to be a faithful and serving wife, even in the hard times. I hope that when I get to the point when I am old and dying, that I will still approach life with a grateful heart, always praising and learning about my Lord.
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