Mom, Are You OK?

It was to be just an enjoyable day of mother/daughter shopping.  School was starting; the daughter was going to be a senior, the excitement of the final year of high school, the upcoming volleyball season.

After shopping for awhile at a well-known department store the mom went to try on an outfit in one of the dressing rooms. 

When it seemed that her mother had been in the dressing room far too long, her daughter knocked on the dressing room door.

“Mom, are you OK?”

But no answer.

When she opened the door she was horrified to see her mother slumped on the floor.  She thought at first that she had simply fainted.  But at the hospital the truth became agonizingly real. 

The mom, a young 41 years of age, had suffered a brain aneurysm and had died almost instantly.

The day had started out with such joy and hope and laughter and dreams.

But by the end of the day the 44 year old husband and father was making funeral arrangements for his wife and his only child’s mother.

That evening I told the story to my wife; when we had our bedtime prayers we prayed for that family.  It was hard to hold back the tears for those two whose hearts had been so devastated.

My coworker informed me that he would be unavailable for a couple of hours on a recent Friday because he would be attending a funeral for his wife’s uncle.  The uncle wasn’t real young but neither was he real old.  The previous Friday the family and friends had gone out to eat at a well-liked restaurant and the uncle was one of the attendees at an evening filled with laughter and friendship.  Late that night he got into his vehicle to leave but was struck with a massive heart-attack and died.  When he was found the next day the engine of his vehicle was still running and the uncle still sat in the driver’s seat – one glove on and one glove off.  

Both my wife and I were saddened (and shocked) to hear that a pastor friend of ours had passed away suddenly.  He hadn’t been sick, but when his wife went to wake him the next morning she found that he had died quietly in his sleep.

The psalmist wrote so many centuries ago, “As for man, his days are as grass: as a flower of the field, so he flourisheth.  For the wind passeth over it, and it is gone; and the place thereof shall know it no more.” (Psalm 103:16-17)

Tomorrow may be too late to tell your spouse that you love them, to hug your kids, to call your parents, or to give your heart to Jesus.

Lord, help us to follow the advice of Moses, “So teach us to number our days, that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom.” (Psalm 90:12)

Dan Vander Ark

Copyright 2014

FindMyPhone!

I went for my daily walk this morning (which this week fell on a Saturday) and decided to go up through Quarry Park and up to Skyline Blvd. I always bring my camera with me as its a beautiful area and I might run into a photojournalistic opportunity.

As I trudged methodically along, I saw a smartphone laying on the trail (“lying” on the trail?). I picked it up and continued to walk up to Skyline, all the while wondering how I would get it back to the correct owner. I reached my goal and started back down. After a few more yards the phone began to ring! It was the "findmyphone" app and it just said, "Whoever finds this phone please call 555-555-1234." (BTW that's not the actual number...that's that secret phone number that is used in so many TV shows and movies that you should never, ever call!). I figured I was the "whoever" on the phone display so I called the number. 

I got voicemail...

It was a female voice by the name of Kathleen and she directed me to leave a message. So I left a message stating that I had just found her phone and if you want to call me I will get the phone to you...we could meet like at the middle of the Bong Bridge...you with your posse and me with mine. Just in case.

I kept walking, expecting my phone to ring at any moment, but it didn't. 

So I continued my methodical trudgery down the trail. Coming up the trail was a young man and he asked, "Hey did you find a phone?" I said yep and he rattled off the EXACT phone number that showed up on the display. He said my dog was dragging me down the hill and the phone must have fallen out of my pocket.

So I handed him the phone and he said, "Thanks!" and I continued downhill and him uphill.

I got to the bottom of the trail and my phone rang. It was that phone number that showed up on the findmyphone app. I thought well maybe the guy lost his phone again and he's calling me to see if I found it again. 

But instead, it was Voicemail Kathleen. She said, "You left me a message about finding something?" I said (a little puzzled), "I found your phone." And she said, "Can you describe it to me? What kind is it?" 

Egads! I don't know! All I know it was black!

So now all of a sudden, I am thinking I just gave a phone to some total stranger that just "happened" to rattle off the EXACT phone number that showed up on that findmyphone app (I quickly did the math in my head and the odds of that happening are equivalent to me finding the lost city of Atlantis at the bottom of Chub Lake). 

I was just about ready to tell Kathleen that I had given her phone to "some guy" that "just happened" to know her phone number. But just then THE GUY came walking down the trail and I mumbled something about, "He just showed up," and he grinned and asked me, "Is that Katie?" (I quickly did the math in my head and figured that the Katie he was referring to is the same Kathleen/Katie that I am talking to).

I just handed him my phone and they chatted like they apparently knew each other and he said to her, "Yep some really nice guy that looks an awful lot like Papa Smurf (except he's not blue) found your phone and gave it to me...some totally random stranger! Can you imagine that???"

I took a picture of a dead leaf and went home.

The End :>)

(Originally written in October of 2020)