Tough love

This has been quite the year for me. It all began when I experienced the worst case of the flu that I’ve ever had. I hugged the commode for three days and threw up so hard that I ripped a muscle in my neck that felt like an inch wide strip of flesh had viciously been torn out of my neck from the top of my shoulders to the base of my skull. I could not turn my head without stiffly turning my entire body for a month afterwards.

Then a month or two later I bit into a steak and my front teeth were so loose they nearly fell out and blood was dripping down my chin. I went to the periodontist and he sliced and diced my gums, carved a section out of the roof of my mouth and grafted it to my gums. He scraped bones, and did bone grafts using bovine bone. The pain was excruciating. Not to be outdone my dentist came right behind him pulling teeth, drilling, chiseling, and fitting crowns and bridges for every tooth in my head over a period of a couple of months.

Not long afterwards I was rushed to the hospital with searing chest pains and I just knew I was having a heart attack. It wasn’t my heart, but gallstones blocking my bile duct, and it was agonizingly painful as my gall bladder nearly exploded. It was surgically removed and my digestive system was turned upside down for weeks on end, not to mention the PAIN.

Then a malignant tumor was found on my back and a plum sized hunk of meat was carved out taking the skin cancer with it. Next there was the chemo. Raw lesions covered my face, neck, and arms for a month. And then it got infected. Finally it healed and I could go back out in public.

And just when I thought my problems were over, my back started hurting for a couple of days, each day getting worse and worse. Then on my birthday last Saturday I couldn’t manage to even sit up or stand because of the immense back pain. I was rushed by ambulance to the hospital. I had an MRI today and will find out on Thursday if my disc has ruptured. If so, more surgery, screws, steel rods, and more PAIN.

So much for the physical pain. The mental pain and grief, which is far worse, began when my beloved stepmother Betty died a difficult death a couple of months ago. She promised God that she would take care of Dad until he died, but she was denied her wish. Dad lives on but he is miserable at 89 with Parkinson’s disease and a broken heart as he is all alone, sick, weak, feeble, and mourning the loss of the love of his life. It is painful to see him like this and I wish there were something I could do.

The finale is the disappointment in the sale of my book, “Miracle on Luckie Street”. I started working on it in 2005 and finished it this year. I view it as the top accomplishment of my life aside from obtaining salvation and my wonderful family. I have only released it to WFTD readers and the employees at Horizon Software, but sales to this group of folks were far less than expected. In fact they were fairly dismal. I know with marketing I can sell plenty of books to the public at large, but the disappointment was that some of those who mean the most to me weren’t interested in it and yeah that hurt a little.

Physical pain, mental anguish, and disappointment was 2010. Amazingly I am not the least bit depressed and am totally at peace. I have such a good outlook on life that I really don’t know anyone more optimistic than I am and every morning in spite of my gruff demeanor, I wake up in a good mood. Yes I grimace from pain, grieve for Betty, get mad at my employees when they vex me, and my tears for all of the above are real, but deep down inside I know the wonderful joy that can only come from God. I love life in spite of its down moments and I eagerly anticipate heaven when I go toe up. I am at an exceedingly good point in my life. I have such powerful faith in God that I just wish that everyone could submit their lives fully to God and experience it.

I always start working on my goals during the Thanksgiving holidays and continue through all of December right up until January 15th. By then they will be finalized and in writing. I analyze what I accomplished last year and list all of my weak points, (there are many), and then I concentrate on finding ways to put them in the positive column. I define the projects that I want to accomplish in the spiritual, personal, and professional categories and then work diligently to accomplish them throughout the following year. I literally cannot wait to get them fully defined and to get going on them for 2011.

Tonight I took my pain medication and when it started kicking in I quickly sat down to write this WFTD in order that I might sit here long enough to get it done before the pain becomes blinding. Satan will not defeat me; the Lord rebuke him.

Okay, okay, if I am to be totally honest with you, there is one thing that has gotten me down just a bit. I cannot bend down and put my socks on, so my wife has been helping me. Every day I have to listen to her nagging and telling me that my toenails are too long and that I should be ashamed for allowing them to get in such deplorable condition. Blah blah blah – It’s too cold to wear flip flops and I cannot sleep wearing socks or I’d never take them off.

Sigh Get behind me satan!


Psalm 46:1
God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble. Therefore we will not fear, though the earth should change and though the mountains slip into the heart of the sea; though its waters roar and foam, though the mountains quake at its swelling pride. Selah.

2 Tim 1:7
For God did not give us a spirit of timidity (of cowardice, of craven and cringing and fawning fear), but [He has given us a spirit] of power and of love and of calm and well-balanced mind and discipline and self-control.