Previous Challenge Entry (Level 1 – Beginner)
Topic: Inner Strength (04/20/06)
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TITLE: Becoming Less | Previous Challenge Entry
By Amelia Klemp
04/25/06 -
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“I am not your ‘sweetie’,” she retorted, but only in her own mind. She opened her mouth to speak but quickly stopped, saving herself the humiliation as she remembered the gibberish that would ultimately fall from her tongue. Her eyes grew hot with salty tears. One escaped tracing a line to her ear and tickling the inside as it formed a small puddle at the entrance of her canal.
“I can hear you! Stop talking so loud!” her mind shouted, as it raced with what she would say when she was able. But she wondered if her words would ever return. Her words -- they were very source of her wholeness. How could she live without them? A PhD in Literature, a published writer, the insult was more personal than she could bear. She could understand how the weakness in her arms and legs might be rehabilitated; although, she had already decided that if her strength never returned she would manage; but how could they MAKE her speak. The words were imprisoned, pounding against the inside of her skull, sometimes forcing themselves out of her mouth only to be met with confused looks of pity, as if she might as well have been speaking an undiscovered ancient tongue. And her writing wasn’t much better. Her one-year-old daughter was stiff competition in both areas.
“Why?” she demanded. “I know its cliché. How could You do this? I’ve done everything I can to please You. I’ve stayed true to Your Word, I’ve used the gifts You gave me, I’ve made something of myself, I’ve done it all…”. Her eyes stung her once again. The grief was too strong, and she needed someone to blame, but as she listened to herself she knew the answer. She closed her eyes refusing to let the pain escape through her tears, refusing to hear the answer, but they would not be contained. Along with the tears the anger and defiance began to flow out uncontrollably and the Spirit of God took advantage of the open space.
“I did not do this, but I WILL use it. It’s not about you, don’t you see? If you want to see what I have in store for you then YOU need to get out of the way and stop fighting me with all YOUR strength.”
By now, she had stopped resisting the release and allowed herself to be emptied. Her bath was done. The aide had “styled” her hair, but she was helpless to fix it. The nurse and the physical therapist lifted her 130-pound frame into the wheelchair and set her limp arm on the attached tray. Her husband walked through the door carrying the blond, blue-eyed wonder that was their daughter. She smiled at the two loves of her life and remembered the lasts words she read the night it all changed -- the words of John the Baptist from prison, “He must become greater; I must become less.” As they drew closer she reached up her left arm, her “good” arm, and cupped the cheek of her daughter with her hand. She opened her lips and said in a voice that barely resembled her own, “Baby!”
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