The Call

Several years ago, on a Friday night in February, I had just walked into the house and the phone rang. Caller ID revealed that my mom was on the other end, so I answered with a cheerful "Hello!" I was not met with a cheerful reply, instead I was met with panic. "Your dad had a heart attack the EMTs are here working on him I'm following the ambulance to the hospital" all in one breath. All I said was "I'll meet you there." I told my husband just fragments of what was happening and was out the door in a rush. When I got into my car and started driving, I felt like a balloon that was deflating in slow motion. The 26 mile drive to the town they live in took me less than 15 minutes and I got there just in time to watch them load my dad into the LifeFlight helicopter. That was a scary, horrible time for my entire family...a time that I think back to far more often than I care to. Dad was lucky though, he was one of the few that make it through a situation such as his.

Following that situation, everytime the phone rings & I see Mom's number on the caller ID, my first thought goes back to that moment. My heart drops and I have a split second of panic as I pick up the receiver. I am not joking....this happens every single time!

Fast forward to Saturday night.....it was my son's 6th birthday and Mom & Dad were planning on coming up to our house after work. I had already talked to Mom three or four times within an hour about the birthday party, so when my phone rang and I saw it was her, I figured there was another "plan" we hadn't discussed yet....no fleeting thoughts of trouble with my dad had entered my mind. I answered with a cheerful "hello" only to be met with "Dad is at the ER they are taking him to Omaha!" (Omaha is a city 90 minutes from their town....the same city that LifeFlight had taken him to several years earlier). Apparently, he had an appointment with his cardiologist and things weren't going so well for him. He had high blood pressure and chest pressure so they wanted him at the Cardiac Center to be able to monitor him through the weekend with another heart catheterization in the immediate future.

Boy how life can change in a hurry! One second I'm thinking about party decorations and getting presents wrapped, and the next minute I am brought to my knees with news of imminent danger. Isn't it absolutely amazing how we can go from happy-go-lucky to frozen stiff with fear in about 1.4 seconds? How one short phone call can drastically change your life in a single instant. Ever since the 2nd heart episode with my dad, I think about that daily....how I could be going along without a care in the world and could receive "the call" that could change everything.

The good news of the story is that my dad did have his heart cath and things are as good as can be expected. Of course, I will still cringe when I see their phone number on caller ID and will think the worst for a few seconds - that reaction will never change for me. Also, the good news is that with Dad's latest little incident, I was once again brought back to my realtionship with God...something that had been a little absent in my life here as of late. The seriousness of dad's condition brought me right where I needed to be, on my knees in front of my heavenly father...a place that I just haven't visited too much lately.

I look back on all of the happenings now..and even look at what I titled this blog entry and think to myself that although the original call was to me by my mom, it goes deeper. Yes, I did receive a telephone call from her regarding the health of my dad, but I believe that all of that was used as a vehicle from God to bring me to answer his call....the call that I've been ignoring over the past several months because life was just getting in the way.

As is said in Revelations 3:20 "Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with him..."