Random Acts of "Kindness"

Archive for December, 2015

FRUSTRATED

I noticed that when I was driving our car, it seemed to hesitate when I was waiting for a light to change. At first, it occurred only once or twice when I was stopped at a light. Sometimes it didn’t happen at all. I first noticed it in the summer, when my husband was driving. It reappeared in October and didn’t seem to happen when I was driving. But whatever is wrong with the car — happened more often. I was concerned. I was afraid that our car would stop when we were in the country and we wouldn’t get it started again..

Since my husband has signed up with the Veteran program — the hospital that he will use is more than 30 miles away from home. It is mostly express way or toll way driving which is why we chose that particular place rather than something in the city with its traffic problems. He had an appointment on Tuesday and I was concerned that we might get stuck on the highway. He took the car into the garage on Monday, which was our only free day for the week. (The rest of the week was extremely busy — my plans, God laughed.)
They determined the problem was caused by the ignition module and changed it. Tuesday morning, the car was worse. My husband had an appointment with a doctor in North Chicago. There was NO WAY we were driving that far. I canceled the appointment and rescheduled. The car went back to the garage — this time it was a fuel injection part. I had planned to ask about my husband’s prescription for insulin at the hospital. He was on his last pen and refills hadn’t arrived. The VA doctor had informed me that she had ordered the medicine.

Wednesday, we had planned to go to the clinic for an exercise and nutrition class. We drove three stop lights when the original problem occurred AGAIN. Sadly, we drove the car back to the garage. I phoned the clinic and cancelled our class, inquiring into the prescription for the insulin. I learned that the prescription was on hold — it hadn’t been approved yet. Nobody told us. Arriving back home, I placed an order for a refill with his non VA prescription. It will cost us more money but we will have control. I won’t have to worry about the mail delivery.

It is Thursday. The car is STILL AT THE GARAGE! They haven’t figured out what is causing the problem. Thankfully we can go to the songfest scheduled for today by walking. I can take a bus to get my husband’s prescription. With our unexpected free time, I baked cookies and put up more Christmas decorations. I am really praying that the problem with our car will be resolved. Even though it has more than 200,000 miles — it was running without any problems. We can’t afford to replace it right now.

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VISIT

I’ve already shared that I start the day with a reading from the bible, followed by a reading from Queen Of Angels. Tuesday I opened the bible to Jeremiah 46 — “The message which the Lord gave to the prophet Jeremiah.” I opened Queen of Angels to — “Do I recognize this time of my visitation?” Did I pay special attention to these readings? Good question — answer “NO”.

It was a shopping day — my husband needed prescription refills. While at the store I decided that I would down load the pictures from my camera, get ready for Christmas. The machine DID NOT recognize the film. Neither did the other two machines that I tried. Going back to the first machine that had been successful in the past, I put the film in, which promptly fell to the floor. The film is a micro, very tiny. Immediately I was concerned — was the film damaged? Had I lost all my pictures? Evidently the fall woke the film up, the photos loaded onto the machine — over two hundred. After I chose the hard copy photos, ordered the DVD, I learned that the photo machines were down. Copies would take longer to process. When I shared my experience to a friend at the store, she remarked, “You know what was going on don’t you?” I will admit that I wasn’t surprised when I was told the printers were acting up. I didn’t necessarily put one and one together.

The rest of the shopping trip followed suit. My husband and I stopped at Fed X to make copies of the Christmas Letter. Then we stopped at a grocery store. It isn’t my normal shopping place — I only needed coffee and flour. Four shopping bags later — not only did I have coffee and flour, I had Dreamfield elbow macaroni, which is very hard to find and other supplies which were also on sale. After all, Christmas is coming and I have cookies to bake. I’m going to have to visit this store more often.

We stopped for lunch at a fast food place — wraps were the special of the day. One of the choices was Greek. When I inquired, I learned it was a gyro in a wrap. It was delicious, it was huge, half of it went home with me.

We returned to Costco to see if the pictures were ready. They were! Walking to our car, I found a couple of evergreen branches on the pavement. I LOVE the smell of evergreens, they came home with me. We have an artificial tree.

We stopped at the pet supply store — they had a new flavor in a brand that I buy for Robin — Merrick Great Plains Red Recipe — Robin LOVED IT — out of the bag, no cheese added.

We stopped at Trader Joes. I mentioned to the person running the samples that I looked for Fried Mushrooms with out success. As I was standing in line, he came out with two bags of frozen mushrooms, that had just come in. One was my fried mushrooms — it came home with me.

Arriving home, I was greeted by a huge poinsettia plant on the table, a gift from our neighbors.

Did I have a visitation that day? I know so!

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FRIDAY

I’m not superstitious — I didn’t expect problems on Friday the 13th. I had problems in SPADES! We had visited our doctor the day before and he requested the pricing on my husband’s medicines. My husband has enrolled with the VA and getting his prescriptions from the VA would save us money. The problem — the VA doesn’t have many of my husband’s medicines nor do they have a substitute. I had copied the pricing for his medicines when we were looking for a new prescription plan.

I found the paperwork BUT when I looked at the pricing — it didn’t make sense. Some of the costs in the GAP were lower than the non-GAP pricing. I tried to access the pricing on the computer. Roadblocks upon roadblocks. I tried phoning our agent for the insurance. He wasn’t available and didn’t return my phone call. I tried accessing the insurance plan itself. My first phone call — I was on hold for a very long time. When I finally contacted a person, I LOST the call. I wasn’t able to get the pricing on all the medicines but I did get the cost of medicines he would have filled in December.

I had asked for the doctor’s e-mail address before leaving the office. The e-mail wouldn’t go through — WRONG ADDRESS. I tried phoning the doctor’s office, and left a message on their answering machine. The message must have gotten lost, my phone call wasn’t returned.

I heated a container of chicken noodle soup in the microwave, then spilled the hot liquid all over my hands. I kept reminding myself that it was Friday the 13th. Lavender essential oil helped the burn.

We received a check in the mail, and was advised we didn’t have direct deposit. I KNEW I had filled out the information but evidently it didn’t stick. One phone call later, the woman I talked to, after giving her all the information requested realized she could only answer questions, not input the information. I was told to call back on Monday. ?? Friday the 13th — AGAIN!

Saturday — sunny, windy, cool day. Our grandchildren were in town and I thought a visit to Maggie Daley park would be possible. The kids dressed in layers so they could take off their heavy coat when they got overheated. They had a fantastic time until our grandson collided with a sculptured tree in the enchanted forest. He had experienced a concussion in the spring which really limited his activities. His head HURT –he was afraid that he had received another concussion. I have to admit that I was worried as well.

Leaving the park, I slipped on the stairs and quickly descended. Somehow I managed to stop the fall with my shoulder, wedging it into the railing. Sore shoulder AGAIN but nothing broken.

Sunday, I realized that both my grandson and I had received “HELP”. Although both of our injuries could have been severe, we had been protected from serious injury. The bruise on my arm was on a muscle, not on the shoulder itself. Sunday I learned of the attacks in Paris on Friday. No wonder I had so many problems, my friends were busy else where. Thankfully they were back on Saturday.

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SPEAK UP

Growing up, I was very shy. For many reasons I stayed in the background — not actively participating unless I was called on in school. With the passing of time I’ve changed. I took a speech class in junior college, none of my classmates believed it when I said in a speech that I was shy. I’m still not an activist, still staying in the background until I feel strongly enough about something to speak out. I have no trouble cautioning children when I think someone is going to get hurt.

Recently I’ve learned that something I wrote about has made a difference. At the camper, across from our campsite, is a small park. The playground equipment is limited — a slide, climbing bar and a swing set. Our children and grandchildren have played there over the years. Even though the playground is so small and limited, children in our area visit it on a regular basis. On Saturday, when we were allowed to return to the campground after the tornado, the park was hidden from view by fallen trees. The slide was completely demolished. The swing set remained untouched. On Sunday, I heard children’s voices coming from the park. On Monday, a group from the Southern Baptist church were in the park, removing trees, making it safer for the children to play. On Monday I wrote a speak up sheet asking that the park be replaced, children were already using it. I learned that plans were in place to replace the park. Since that conversation, I didn’t think about the park anymore.

The week before we closed up the camper for the winter, a couple of men were across the street in the park when we returned from an outing. I walked across the street to talk. I learned two facts — first: plans were in place to get new equipment for the park. The swing was the first piece of equipment that was placed in the park when it was created. The slide set that was tossed by the winds had been more recently installed. The second thing that I learned was that management HAD NOT PLANNED TO REPLACE THE PARK. I was extremely glad that I had wrote a speak up sheet. Sometimes our words make a difference!

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