Home Alone - - - Again!

My wife has left me again. She is over in Louisiana for a sibling reunion at her sister’s home near the Toledo Bend Reservoir. She and her older brothers, Cleon and Bro. Milton along with her sister, Dorothy, are all very excited about being together this week. I am glad for them but not as excited about being home alone. This is what I am obsessing about on this Tuesday, June 2, 2009. What is it about being home alone that gives so much freedom but I find myself already missing that special lady who has been beside me these nearly forty five years? Maybe its because yesterday morning I received a call from a worker here at our company who was all broken up because his wife had passed away during the night. They have had a long and loving marriage. She had fought a fast moving cancer and while brokenhearted he was so relieved to see her no longer suffering and struggling for every breath.

Or maybe it was the conversation I had with a fellow a couple of weeks ago who had lost his wife last year. He is about my age and they, like us, had married young, and had been together for many years. He said he just had not been able to adjust. Everyone invited him to this event and that program, this outing, or that fellowship, but he just didn’t seem to fit in. He told me he could pretty well handle it when he was working each day in the sizable construction company he owns but when he arrived at home each evening it was a horrible feeling because she was no longer there. He said he thought he now understood what the Bible meant when it said: “They shall be one flesh.” (Genesis 2:24; Matthew 19; Mark 10:8; and Ephesians 5:31) He said he felt as if part of him had been torn away from him. I tried to encourage him but also knew it was difficult to identify with his pain having not experienced this same loss.

My wife and I often laugh about how we have trouble sleeping when the other is out of town. It’s not as if we offer any great sense of increased safety by being together but there is something to that sentiment expressed in the country song about how painful it is to be sleeping single in a double bed. She left very early yesterday morning and I talked to her several times as she made her journey. Once she crosses into Louisiana her cell phone signal becomes null and void but I will be keeping up with her while she is at her sister’s place. In many respects this is a miracle reunion for these four siblings given the extended near death vigil we experienced with Bro. Milton. The fact that he was able to make the trip from Florida is nothing short of amazing. He spoke at a Church reunion this past Saturday in Oakdale, Louisiana. This was his first time to speak since going down with a major heart failure and stroke. They tell us he was very nervous and repeated himself more than he would have normally. But the folks there, recognizing God’s hand on this man of God, stood and praised God for him being able to be there. I know they will have plenty of food, fun, and fellowship punctuated with much laughter, hugs and tears. These will be tears of joy and tears of thanksgiving. Meanwhile, I will be like little Kevin in the Home Alone movie running up and down the stairs screaming to my heart’s content, basically because I can, and with my ‘better half’ missing, who will be there to keep me under control? Now that my friend is a scary thought! Amen. …..More later.