Sharing isn't always a good thing...

It isn't ever said out loud.

To do so must violate some sort of private, secret, inviolable trust that keeps everyone sniffling, hacking and gagging their way through the fall and winter months like bags of viral filth.

I know being where you said you'd be is important. I get it.

In our own way, we all want to believe we are the indispensable quotient that makes the world go round, the sun shine and the planetary alignment create 'magic'.

Not so fast there, pardner...

I promise, if you take a few sick days to keep your snotty nose and dribbly eyes to yourself and actually take some rest, we'll ALL feel better.

However, that under normal circumstances is a sufficent warning left unheeded on a regular enough basis to make sure that we are compelled to share, incubate and harvest the mutated germs on a rotating scale.

There must be a secret schedule of which I remain blissfully unaware yet fall victim to quite often.

Family A is assigned to bring their germy selves to church and kiss everyone. The following week, Family G is assigned to bring a DIFFERENT mutation and reinfect the masses. The combination of the two variant forms is enough to keep attendance down for at least three full weeks.

But lest anyone think that good sense kicks in at this point, let me assure you that is not the case.

It's like they are in the lobby of the church telling everyone, "Yeah, I was pukin' up chunks of liverish looking stuff last night and had a fever of 732 degrees before the chills and gut wrenching explosive diarrhea set in, but when it was time to come to church I just couldn't miss… you should have smelled the bathroom and see the mess we all left in there. Bobby, Sissy and Mary Jane were all just heaving up their guts, but I was firm and told them 'We ain't gonna be missing seeing the Franchiones bless their new little one and I'm a gonna kiss that sweet baby all over it's little face'."

"Well, when I said that, they was up and dressed jack rabbit quick, although Bobby had to borrow a shirt from Buddy Earl because he blew chunks on it just as we was about to get buckled into the car. Made me kinda mad since them grits and eggs don't wash out of upholstery all that good, but we're here and that's what counts."

"Now, where is yor Daddy so I can give him some sugar….?"

You have to wonder about the level of sanity in the room at that point. I have actually asked people "Why did you come if everyone was sick today? The church won't fall down if you miss church to keep your mutated germ of the week at home to die a long, slow death in the privacy of YOUR home. I don't want what you have and neither does ANY ONE ELSE!"

They look at me like I am insane.

Sure thing, sugar booger. It's me that's nuts here...

While you are making smear slides and 24-hour Petri dish samples of your disgusting pus and phlegm, you can sing a song to pass your time:

(to the tune of "Now Let Us Rejoice")

Now let us all gather and share all our spittle
I'll sneeze and I'll dribble my germs onto you

And while you're not looking, I'll cough on your nostrils
And leave you sick and tired For the full week ahead.


Then I'll skip off laughing
'Cause I passed my germs off


and you'll be in the bed
feverish and half dead


But next week I will come back
and do it all over


and pass off all new germs
to all of your frail kin!

I wonder if they sell Lysol© in a tank sprayer...?

Life Shows Up to Claim Us All

I'm sitting at a cancer treatment facility waiting on my Dad. His recent diagnosis for Non-Hodgkin's Lymphoma brings an uncomfortable reminder of my own cancer battle several years ago. I am learning that none of us needs to feel immune to this equal opportunity offender.

While waiting for his name to be called, I ran into a friend from when our kids had been in band together. Cancer found her, too.

We mortal beings can be quite fragile.

We all want to be ten foot tall and bulletproof, but none of us is. Sadly, we all bear the reality of the physical Achilles heel that leaves it's wounds upon us and digs deep the scars of circumstance.

Treatment options are individual and varied and totally dependent upon what the magic blood test numbers tell them at each pit stop along the pathway that leads either to restoration or resolution of life into eternity.

Some are granted more time to spend with those whom they love, as I was.

Others are cruelly denied the blessing of "one more day" and must instead learn the bitter language of 'goodbye'.

Where the wheel of fortune stops is a mystery to us all.

There was a man who said that a lot of people wandered around after getting their diagnosis of cancer saying "why me?"

He said he believed that to be fatalistic to wonder why this had come. Instead, he told me, we need to say "why not me?" and look for ways to fight, pray and overcome.

Not all battles are won on this side of the finish line between mortality and eternity. By Divine design, some victories are etched in mortal suffering that can only be understood as we see them through the lens of Heaven.

I confess that I do not know the outcome of this all. But of one outcome I am certain. This world as it now stands is not our home. It's more like a way station between our beginning and our eternal destination.

We may be compelled to wade bitter waters of circumstance, ford the raging streams of adversity and drown our faces in the tears that are shed for the sorrow we feel for ourself and others.

But it is temporary.

The tides of opposition will be stilled and we will come off in the conquest that comes through faith in God's design.

In the meantime, we just have to keep putting one foot in front of the other - literally AND figuratively. This is just a small moment.

I keep telling myself that.

But some days, that moment sure does last a long time.