Some better news

There's not a lot to say about the events (in DC) of yesterday. There was an awful lot of wild speculation going on ("Three shooters") and we still don't know much about it. The evil humans are capable of, though....it boggles the mind. Every person who was shot and killed was important to somebody - their kid, their spouse, a friend, their brother....

(And I admit, I quickly did an online map search to verify that the place where my sister-in-law works in DC was sufficiently far away for her probably to have been unaffected. It may have changed the route she took to get home....but as I have not heard anything, I assume they weren't even locked down).

Anyway. The better news - I called my friend again yesterday afternoon. She apologized for having not called me back Sunday (but that doesn't matter - she had lots of visitors and was tired). So I got over to see her.

I think the visit did me as much good as it did her. And again I'm reminded of how some of the people in my congregation, as much as I may love them, tend to be a bit overdramatic about things. My friend was pretty much her old self (she didn't seem depressed to me, and it didn't seem like she was "putting on a good face") Of course, the fact that they seem to have got her dosages regulated and that she's eating more or less normally again (she said her son had cooked her dinner last night) probably helped. But it was good for me to see her doing fairly well, talking about the time when she can get back to church and to work. She said the doctor was encouraging her to get up and go outside for 20 minutes or so a day (to get some sun, I presume) and that her main concern right now is that her balance isn't so good and she's concerned about falling.

She did have a lot of people around - her daughter was there, and while I was there, another woman from church stopped by, and two of the local police (for a few years, she has been one of the police chaplains) stopped by to see if she needed anything.(Which tells me that though paying another visit will be nice, I don't have to do so immediately - she's not being left alone too much).

I did call first; she told me as I was leaving not to bother to call when I came back. For me, I really prefer people to call if they are coming over, but I guess not everyone is like that.

Of course, I'm also not real big on having people visit out of the blue, especially if I'm not feeling well - if I'm sick, I really prefer mostly to be left alone. I might appreciate someone going out and getting food for me, or staying for a few minutes - but if I'm really feeling lousy I just want to stay in bed and not have to try to interact with people.

That may be part of the reason that the whole visitation thing is the one Elder duty I am really bad at. The leadership stuff, the praying at the table, all of that I can do. But when it comes to visiting people who are sick or shut-in....well, it's something I put off. I think it's because I think that if I were in that situation I'd mostly like to be left alone, and I'm afraid they'll really not feel like visiting but will feel obligated to say, "Yes, come on over" when I call. (I'm also bad about phoning. Because, to be honest, I kind of hate the phone. I can't see people's expressions so I can't always judge their mood very well over the phone, and when I'm at home working, I admit it annoys me sometimes to have the phone ring and feeling obligated to go answer it). And yes, I understand there's a difference between introverts and extroverts and I'm an extreme example of the first category, but still....that fear of putting someone out, maybe, makes it hard for me to enjoy the process of planning to go visit.


I'm still working on the prayer shawl for her - I added the third ball of yarn last night. But now I'm feeling that it's going to be more of a "Yay, you beat a pulmonary embolism and are now well enough to come back to church" shawl than any kind of comfort-while-sick shawl. (And it's interesting how different it is working on a shawl for someone where you're saying prayers of thanks for their recovery rather than prayers asking that they be healed)