MY GRACE-FILLED FRECKLE....

MY GRACE-FILLED FRECKLE

How I love the blessing of Spring.....everything that was dead and dormant is new and renewed.  I never grow tired of sitting quietly in my favorite worn-out chair with the indentation of my butt on it literally watching the leaves bud out with a strong hot cup of coffee sliding down my throat watching the GRACE occur.   And that's exactly where I am right now as I talk to you, my friends.....the ones who love me in spite of myself.

This has been a difficult week......but a week filled with much GRACE.  I capitalize GRACE cause it simply deserves to be capitalized.  As many of you know, I am wearing hats these days.....cute, stylish, weird and funny hats.....not because I'm strongly battling chemo from cancer or a sudden case of balding.....but because of a freckle just inside my hairline on the top of my head.  A freckle.  No bigger than a dot made from an ink pen....but a very "quiet" skin cancer. 

Five....5.....cuts at what should have been a simple one, maybe 2-hour doctor office visit for Mohs surgery to remove this freckle a week ago Friday...moved into the 6-hour mark and a portion of my scalp shaved (yes...SHAVED) along with several inches of my scalp removed.  I'm not telling you this because I want your sympathy....although that's exactly what I did yesterday to my family as I texted them all begging for sympathy for which I now apologize.....(those dang drugs).....but because I want to share the GOOD.....the GRACE that came out of this past 10 days.  Yep....the GRACE.

I've never considered myself a very vain person.....I wear torn jeans to the grocery store, I wear minimal make-up, it takes me all of 46 seconds to fix my hair in the morning and I love buying my clothes from Goodwill.  But after about the 3rd cut on my head, I felt my bottom lip quivering, the salty sting of my tears rolling down past the surgical drape over my eyes as I heard the buzz of the shaver in that surgical chair.  Not because I feared dying or how much this would hurt.....but because of what I would "look" like to YOU.....and to myself.  And as I bit my lower lip so the nurse wouldn't notice me crying, I experienced the most amazing GRACE wrap It's arms around me....and settle me down.

Awww.......there's nothing a little GRACE can't heal.....even a nasty, gaping hole in the head where there once was a freckle.  But the GRACE in my life looks like the pictures I've included below....and GRACE looks like a make-upless, jump-in-her-car, barely-had-shoes-on friend named Pam that drove over just to hold me when I had a massive, extremely ugly, crying meltdown "just because".....GRACE looks like sterilized Goodwill hats purchased for me by sweet Cheryl so I had variety....and who even wore one with me to church so I wouldn't stand out.....and GRACE looks like the adorable little tike in the pew in front of me at church who made me laugh just as I was about to cry from hearing the song Amazing Grace because I'm LIVING Amazing GRACE....and GRACE looks like the family in love with each other two rows ahead of me as they worship together.....

GRACE looks like the beautiful hairstyle my dear, amazing friend FROSTY (yep, that's her name!!) gave me the day before the freckle was removed, that carries a heavy load on her shoulders that many of us would collapse under......GRACE looks like the dear friend/neighbor.....you know, one of those people we are lucky if we have even one of in this lifetime....and mine's name is BECKY.....who, even though she hates driving in the city, drove her bandaged neighbor through the canyon of Downtown Dallas at 5:30 on a Monday evening after a day of plastic surgery.....GRACE looks like food, mixed with doses of prayers, from neighbors and friends to feed my husband cause his wife is throwing up and doesn't want to wake up until everything is healed and hair has grown back (refer back to "Vanity" paragraph above)......GRACE is friends who doctor my wounds when most would puke looking at the wound much less touching it......and GRACE is the "smell" sense in all of us that makes us "smile" with the love of flowers from family that remind us they are there for us.  And most of all, GRACE is coming home to a wheelchair-bound man who would throw himself in front of a semi to save the life of a dog...or cat...or parakeet or even a scarred, hole-in-the-head wife.  That says a lot about a man.

I could go on for 15 more paragraphs and still not have listed all the GRACE's that came out of this freckle, but I know you are growing weary of reading (if you're even still with me here) and I have a CPA (remember him....the one I have to pray before talking to just to avoid an anxiety attack??) who really needs some questions answered by me, so I will end this conversation with you by saying thank YOU for your many forms of GRACE you showed me and my freckle by your prayers, for your encouraging words, for taking care of my husband, for feeding us, for loving us, for extending your arms to hold me up when I could barely stand.

I am certainly the most BLESSED and GRACED woman I know.