Previous Challenge Entry (Level 4 – Masters)
Topic: HERO (10/01/20)
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TITLE: Super Yoda | Previous Challenge Entry
By Jack Taylor
10/05/20 -
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“How do you do it?” I ask. “You’re here three times a week, hour after hour, sorting over more numbers than I can imagine and you never complain.”
“Oh, I complain,” she says. “When I missed my wheelchair getting off the toilet last week and had to lay on that cold tile in a locked bathroom for two and a half hours before someone found me. Oh, yes, I complained. Then there’s the time that thief walked in here and stole my purse and the other time I got locked in my office and the alarm was ringing and I couldn’t reach up to shut it off.”
File folders filled with receipts, reports and records piled on her desk as the spreadsheet of the church’s income and expenses filled the screen. “How long have you been working here now, Alice?” I ask.
She pauses to think. “Going on nine years now. It’s harder now. The fatigue and pain after work leave me wondering how long I can go on. I’m always having to maneuver into washrooms, check out the latest diet for MS, and travel on the bus to the doctors.”
“I know you’re still living with your son and his family. How is that going?”
She nods and smiles. “I’m still in the basement and I can hear them up there. The kids are getting old enough to read to me and they sing me their Sunday School songs. My son is on his church board and he prays for me almost every day. I have everything I need.”
I rise to leave and then ask, “what did you do before the MS hit you so strong and you got stuck with us?”
She rotates her chair a tad with the toggle switch on the handle. More thought. “I trained to be a fighter pilot but didn’t see any action. My son was born and I stepped away. When he got old enough, I became a paramedic and spent a lot of time-saving addicts from overdoses.” She reached for a pen and circled an invoice number. “I graduated with my MBA when I was fifty.”
I sit again so she doesn’t have to strain her neck trying to see my face. “You’re amazing!” I say. “You must have incredible stories to tell your grandkids.”
An almost invisible shake of her head surfaces with a wince. “I would never do that,” she said. “I tell them about my days riding in a rodeo, about my hot air balloon rides in Africa and about swimming with dolphins in Bermuda. I’ve lived a full life and I still have my memories.”
“Where do you find your hope?”
Her gaze is penetrating. “You know it isn’t here don’t you? I’m never going to get much past retirement if I make it. We don’t believe in Him so we get extra days on the calendar.”
“What do you hope to still do with the days you have left?”
“Quite the little interrogator, aren’t you,” she says. “If you really have to know, I’d like to take a cruise to the Bahamas with my family; I’d like to keep advocating for MS survivors and raise a million dollars; I’d like to share the truth with my sister in Hong Kong before she passes; I’d like to get these church books balanced if someone would stop interrupting me.”
I nod, rise and move to the doorway. “You, my friend, are a giant among women. You have a story to tell and with your permission, I am going to share it.”
She lifts her hand at the wrist in a halting motion. “Please, no,” she says. “My grandkids think I’m just the old lady in the wheelchair. They think I’m just grandma and that’s enough for me.”
“I’d hate for you to have to wait until Jesus says ‘Well done, good and faithful servant!’ before you hear that some of us think you’re worth celebrating.”
“Having you care is enough,” she says. “Go! I need to get some work done before no one is 'saying well' done about anything.”
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