Staying Not Sick - In Sedentary Days

As I look up from my legal pad, I see the spring sun shining on the false peaks that crown the walls of our courtyard apartment. Beyond is the blue of the truly spring day the weather people have promised us. I am sitting in a large comfortable chair in my little alcove study, where I think and write.

When I rise to answer Molly's call to lunch or dinner, or to swing around the corner for a short bathroom run, it's not a dash, or even an easy walk. More like 20 steps of lurch. Even at first there are twinges in the knees, and legs that no longer spring.

I know perfectly well it is more inaction than old age. Although the latter sings a siren song of ease, and rest. "You're doing good work. Take it easy. It will be all right." In fact, it won't. I need to move - every half hour or so.

When I venture downstairs, other white-haired folks are moving about. Some, quite fast. They're in their 70's or even 80's. But, my own Molly, at 89, moves fast.

So, I wait for the Flagship Health Club - part of Lifetime Fitness, to open. It has my favorite rowing machine. I can walk a zig-zag around the perimeter of the gym. with the aid of my Cheyenne River Indian staff, from Leslie Bobtail Bear, my dear, deceased brother there. I can lift a few weights. I leave, clean with a shower, some locker room bantering - feeling as though I've done something. And just a little bit stronger.

Their opening will make spring a little bit sweeter for me. It's a step toward helping me feel better: that I've done something for health, beyond simply eating all those pills, and getting transfused with something or other that is helping my blood get back to normal again.

I pray for all that to be part of spring for me, part of making it for another year in the "merry month of May," and think about life, and try to live it for usefulness. 

It calls for some be-stirring. It calls for prayer. It calls for a purpose in living. It calls for the walk with Jesus, deliberately heading out with Him, listening to His voice, heeding His call.

For I know He has a purpose for every one of His friends, of a journey of a mere twelve men who have changed the world. 

All of us are part of the expanded twelve, who, fired by the evidence of an empty tomb, and the presence of a living Lord, they know the one sure thing, that "He is risen. The Lord is risen indeed!"

How then, can we not get going, and rise up and do what we can do, tell the story that we know so well, and invite others still, to come along with us - walking, talking, moving, learning, engaging all whom we may meet on the way.

Love you for life!
Arthur