Yesterday, I visited a church outside my home community, with a new friend in another city who is seeking a way to connect. Many things about this church were comforting and familiar; the few that were different left me longing for my home community.
Back at home, as I walked through the front door (a few minutes after kick-off Packers-Rams game) I could smell onions and recently cooked food. In my absence my husband had warmed up some nachos for lunch. Then, early this morning, as I gave our bathroom a quick once over, I could smell the cleaning products, and it dawned on me that I have not smelled anything since August when I came down with a summer cold that left me tired and congested weeks later.
I thought about the year I had polyps removed from my sinuses, remembered my post-surgery appointment. After extracting 12 feet of gauze from my nose - or was it 12 feet from each nostril - the doctor asked, "Can you smell anything?"
Apparently, there was a risk I could lose my sense of smell. I was more than a little angry at the doctor for taking that risk without informing me. He explained that patients actually report losing their sense of smell MORE often when they are told ahead of time about the risk. My odds were better if I didn't know.
This morning, my sense of smell is back, and its return leaves me wondering what else I am missing, things I am not experiencing because my body or my mind - or my heart - accepted a risk as a truth.
In my fragile humanity, I am prone to taking a temporary setback and letting my fear transform it into a lifelong disfigurement.
God keeps me from tripping over my own two feet. Psalm 25:14-15
Rw
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