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I was thinking about miracles today -- not the big mamma-jamma miracles of the world, but the little ones. I spent some time appreciating the sweet surprises of meaning, the shock of good news, the offer of help when none is expected, the sympathy or kindness of a stranger. These are all the ordinary miracles of a day, moments when the soul is warmed, when the eyes of the heart open wide.
I got an email today from a friend I had not heard from for a long time. Oh, yes, a miracle! So I decided to wander about and see what everyone was saying about life miracles.
You Mommy-bloggers are great in mentioning miracles -- the births of your children, or their recoveries from illness. The phrase "miracle baby" occurred more than once.
But then I read N and M's blog. N and M talk about what they refer to as the "bittersweet miracle" of adoption. Miracles for one can be something else for another.
There are always two sides to every story. Adoption is no different.
As blessed as we have been to get the honor to raise S, we also recognize that is another side of adoption. The choice. The heartache. The consequences.
The loss. ...
These folks are pretty remarkable in that they appreciate the loss that it was for their particular birth-mother. Miracles can be dense events, with layers of meaning, not all of them lovely for everyone.
Life has taught me to live expecting miracles to happen -- but generally not the miracle I ask for, and generally arriving in strange clothing and at odd times.
In the words of Sarah McLAchlan's tune, "Ordinary Miracle"
When you wake up every day
Please don't throw your dreams away
Hold them close to your heart
'Cause we're all a part of the ordinary miracle
There is a thread in life that connects us. Sarah's right about us all being part of the Ordinary Miracle. When I sit here looking art my computer and realizing that I am connecting with you in a fashion here -- it stuns me. The miracle of wired relating -- a new thing in this world as things go. And yet, what riches of friends it has brought me. A miracle.
When I get observant and quiet enough I start seeing miracles everywhere.
I have a rescue dog. The day I got her, and for the first two or three days after, I was convinced I had made a mistake. She was small, skittish, shy. I was used to big old sloppy bowzer boy dogs. Yet she is now such a joy, and truly a part of my heart. She filled a small pooch shaped hole in my life that I didn't know I had. Zoe is a miracle of the first order.
I should be dead, by all statistics. I never should have discovered my cancer over 25 years ago. My doctor said the pap test was just a slight abnormality and that we should check back in six months. If I had waited, and not changed doctors, I would be dead. The surgeon said that the cancer should not have even shown up on the test the first doctor did. Yet here I am. A bigger miracle, but there it is. I, who resist seeing doctors, pushed on. That's the small personal miracle, that I pushed on. Big miracles are random, in my opinion anyway.
It's the little ones that we can foster and nurture -- by living openly. By living with open arms and an open heart. By inviting possibility, not avoiding it. I loved this story by Kristin about her friend, Jodi. Kristin writes brilliantly about being in downtown Toronto with her friend. They see a woman in the middle of the street dressed in shabby clothing, waving a stick in the air and cursing. Kristin is scared. Jodi walks up to the woman and finds out that she is poor, blind, and has been dropped off by a person who had been on her bus in the middle of the street. The woman is terrified and lost. Jodi helps her to her destination -- a local church across the street.
Jodi left the woman on the curb of All Saints, still blind, still poor, still grumbling about that disappearing bus rider. But at least she had her bearings. She was no longer alone in her panic. It only took a moment of stopping, of noticing, and of reaching out, to restore a human to dignity and to bring a
