Russ Ramsey

The world we inhabit is one where children feel sorrow long before they have the words to express it.

Often the best gifts we can give each other cost nothing.

This woman did not know me, but she knew this stretch of trail. She didn't know if I was kind or mean, gentle or abrasive, honest or a liar. She didn't need to know what I had accomplished in life or what I had wasted. She just knew that if I was there in her hospital on my birthday, I was probably feeling a little lost. On that basis alone, i mattered to her.

If I wanted, I could come up with reasons to be angry with everyone I know; there are sins of commission or omission I could hang on every last person in my life_ The truth is, I will never run out of people to indict. We are all guilty of so many failures to love well that if I wanted--and sometimes I do want--I could find some fault or transgression in everyone I know that I could then use to justify writing them off. I could blaze that trail to hell if I wanted to, and just the thought of it scares me off

There is something holy about taking up the task of stewarding a life, especially our own. If we come to this work at all, we must come with humble expectations and a willingness to be led. We submit to the process, trusting that the science is sound, even when what we__e called to do hurts.

We want the people around us to show us a satisfactory measure of genuine empathy, but no one has any idea what that looks like. This puts everyone in the precarious position of guaranteed failure. I know that no one knows how to deal with stuff like this. There are no experts here.

Walking through suffering is a work that is bound by limitation. Often it isn't that the afflicted are unwilling to let others in. It is just that there comes a certain point in a person's suffering where there is no apparent port of entry.

I, the infirm, find myself caring for the sorrows and fears of the well.

To walk in faith is to confess that we do not know what awaits us, and the faith I have embraced does not promise an easy road.

I do not like being thwarted, but shall I receive good from the God and not also trouble? The voices that say Recover so you can get back to normal, grossly underestimate the gift of this wrecked life. Why is it a gift? Because I would have no compelling reason to step from my comfortable existence into the quest for what__ next if my present security wasn__ taken from me. It is rare for a man to plan his own journey toward growth and change. Usually these journeys are thrust on us unexpectedly_ If my ego tried to plan this journey, it would be limited by the expectations of what I would already hope to find. There would be no element of surprise, wonder, or faith--just a forced march towards a future my present self assumes is what I need. THat would not be a journey of faith but of control--and a fool__ errand. Faith is the conviction to trust that there are good things out beyond what I can see and would never know to pursue--glorious things God himself will bring to pass. I need those glorious things.

With all due respect to my surgeon, in a perfect world he would be out of a job.