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Moses, however, said to the Lord, “If you please, my Lord, I have never been eloquent, neither in the past nor now that you have spoken to your servant; but I am slow of speech and tongue.” The Lord said to him: Who gives one person speech? Who makes another mute or deaf, seeing or blind? Is it not I, the Lord?  – Exodus 4:10-11 (NABRE)

So here I am, now fitted with a voice prosthesis, awaiting my first real speech therapy on Monday. And if I may be frank, it’s not something I am looking forward to. It’s not the work itself that I fear, although it’s going to be a tough road. The troubling thing is that now I have a new set of expectations to live up to, and I fear disappointing myself and others who see this as a solution.

People who have had laryngectomies (removal of the voice box) can usually recover fairly intelligible speech. But having had a glossectomy as well (removal of the tongue) my chances for doing that are much slimmer. Still, I have speech pathologists who are convinced that I can succeed in a significant way. We shall see.

The more meaningful issue for me is how this fits into God’s plan for me. I have maintained all along that this was part of His plan, but so far I have yet to see how this may be so. Charlotte and I were doing our morning readings and this verse came up. A sharp jab in the side told me she wanted me to pay attention. Does God make people mute? This is a subset of the larger question as to why He permits suffering in the first place, a question too large to be addressed here. In any case, I am and may be for some time. And I confess that there is a significant part of me that would happily settle for the status quo. Laziness or fear? I don’t know. Can one be too accepting of one’s station? Again, I don’t know.

We are all faced with opportunities for growth and we are not always eager. Growth can involve a significant amount of pain. New wineskins have to do a lot of stretching and that can’t feel good. But pain is greatly affected by our understanding of its purpose. If someone jabs a needle into my arm for no good reason, the pain is an insult, a needless moment of suffering. But if a doctor must do so to heal me, then it becomes something I can accept with grace. So is my present suffering meaningful? Is this new challenge part of the plan? I hope so. In any case I will assume so because the Spirit of God has given me the grace to endure.

Being a Christian is not something one does in isolation. If I am not connected to the Body of Christ, I will wither and die. Fortunately for me, I am surrounded by a cloud of friends so loving that I can scarcely believe it. The biggest challenge I face in that regard is finding new ways to communicate. Our Marriage Encounter sharing group was held at our house last Saturday, and since we were the hosting couple I could prepare my dialog in advance and play it using my text-to-speech app. And I had a pretty good conversation with one of the couples during our after-meeting social time by writing on my Boogie Board while they read. Not ideal, but more real-time than anything else I can do at present.

I recently spent time listening to recordings of some talks I gave before 2009 (filed under the “Resources” menu), and I came away with two unexpected realizations. One is I talk too fast and say “ya know” constantly. If I were listening to someone else doing that I would probably have gotten up and screamed “Yes, we know!”

The other was that I am grateful that I could speak so easily, off the cuff. Yet I don’t regret the loss of that today. I thought listening to these would sadden me but it had the opposite effect. There’s a line in the Big Book, familiar to many of you, that says “We will not regret the past, nor wish to shut the door on it.” That clearly means that we are at peace with those shameful things in our past that we need not do today. But it can also mean that we are at peace with those wonderful things in our past that we can no longer do today.

A year from now, I may be able to record a greeting to all of you which you may even be able to understand. But that will not be the measure of my success. Voice or no voice, I am loved. And I do not need to speak to love you in return. I am grateful beyond words for all the tender-hearted people God has put in my life, and that is the only measure of success that matters to me today.

Beauty is only skin deep. But ugly goes straight to the bone. – Fred Sanford

Charlotte dragged me kicking and screaming to the 8:00 Sedona meeting today. I have yet to find my niche in the program, but I am certain that God has His plans. People were genuinely delighted to see me, and I got many warm hugs. Since I didn’t bring my writing board, I just smiled as best I can these days and nodded goofily. It’s a struggle letting go of my need to be witty and pithy.

The trip to Detroit is scheduled, but for a number of reasons I have elected to come home as soon as the speech prosthesis is placed (or “the thing” as I will refer to it for the sake of brevity). I plan to work with my speech pathologist (SLP) at Mayo as soon as I get back. I am not getting my hopes up. As the SLP in Detroit reminded me, people who have lost their tongues have a much tougher road than simple (?) laryngectomies. As usual, Charlotte’s hopes are higher than mine, but she handles disappointment better so I can live with that. My motto is “no appointment, no disappointment.” I would rather that “life on life’s terms” exceed my expectations.

The topic of the meeting turned to the joy of sobriety. For as unhappy as I have been feeling lately, I have never lost my joy. Happiness is based on happenstance. Joy is based on the love of God that underlies everything. I have never lost that. To paraphrase Mr. Sanford, “Happiness is skin deep. But joy goes straight to the bone.” How anyone can live a joyless life is incomprehensible to me. I couldn’t do it. It might be argued that my faith in God arises out of a deep need to find purpose and meaning, but that just begs the question. If God draws me to Himself by making me keenly aware of how bereft of joy life would be without His love, then He has achieved His purpose. As I once said to an early AA mentor, “If this is a myth, then it is the most benevolent myth imaginable.” I recently saw Jordan Peterson responding to the question as to whether or not he believed in God, and after a couple of attempts to express it, he said simply, “I act as if God exists. Now you can decide for yourself whether that means I believe in him, so to speak.” A page out of our book, to be sure.

Lest any of you think that the preceding implies a wavering in my faith, let me be quick to reassure. I have always been a skeptic and doubts have always crept in. I had to build a faith that could encompass doubt or it would be no faith at all. One thing I can say with absolute certainty: I made a decision at the age of thirteen that God did not exist, and twenty years later my life could be charitably described as a heap of stinking, smoldering rubbish. So at age thirty-three, I made a decision to “act as if” God existed. Thirty-seven years later the results continue to affirm that living my life on that basis is overwhelmingly the better of the two. I see no reason to reconsider. Neither would Pascal.

So I face this new year with the same profound joy that has brought me this far. I may or may not be “happy,” because I can’t predict what will “happen.” But I can say with certainty that my joy will carry me through, as it always has. So to each of you,  I wish you a joyful new year. Let’s live it to the bone.

Somebody nudged me the other day and asked when I was going to post to this blog again. And again today, someone wanted to know how I am doing. It’s been far too long since my last post and there’s a reason for this, one that I’m not particularly proud of. As a rule, when I post it is because there is something interesting and worth sharing. And I want it to be profound and engaging because frankly I get a lot out of your responses. And I don’t like posting some boring, day to day stuff because there probably won’t be any spectacular response. It never occurs to me that the people who love me just want to include me in their lives. This is pride, the foremost of the Seven Deadlies, and the one that underlies them all.

I have been home a month now and have settled in to what, for now, is the new normal. Maybe you want to know what that is, maybe not. But I’ll share this with you all.

One of the most significant developments for me is that I am finally being fitted for the devices that soon will allow me to produce sounds via a voice prosthesis. It won’t be speech, but it will be a necessary first step. I’ll be back to Michigan in January for the placement of the prosthesis and several intense weeks of speech therapy. As my therapist said, my success is up to me. It’s a long road ahead but he feels that I have the right attitude to pull it off. We shall see.

One side benefit of this is that I can now use a button called an HME (heat/moisture exchanger) that eliminates the need for nightly humidification. One less piece of medical equipment. We returned it the other day. The HME is also a filter that removes larger contaminates like cat hair (no shortage of that here), and the usual junk that floats around. Normally your nose does all of these things. But since mine is now merely decorative, it’s a necessary and welcome replacement.

It’s good to finally be back in familiar surroundings, but I am beginning to realize just how much I need to adjust to function in a world where speech is expected. So I carry around my Boogie Board to write on. And there is a voice to text app on my phone that helps a lot. But other people don’t quite know how to act around me. One guy started writing back at me, assuming that since I couldn’t speak, I couldn’t hear. An understandable but humorous response.

Another thing that is turning out to be harder than I thought is developing a simple sign language that Charlotte and I can use to communicate. It takes a lot of work and we’re usually short on time, or too tired to work on it. So it’s not moving along as I had naively hoped. Patience is the requirement here.

Participating in group discussions is proving to be very problematic as well. I got a taste of it when I was in Michigan during my recuperation, but now it is becoming a point of real frustration for me. We have a bi-weekly bible study that I used to actively contribute to, but it’s the same problem of being ten steps behind the conversation so that by the time I have typed what I want to say I am hopelessly off topic and I end up erasing all the typing I just did. We went to our Marriage Encounter sharing group last night and they started to wrap up the meeting before I had a chance to “say” anything. It’s no one’s fault. I just feel left out and minimized. It’s obvious that people don’t understand what I need from them. Our little Sunday AA meeting in Rochester gave me a chance to actively participate because they came to understand my limitations. From that a comfortable dynamic emerged. But I can’t expect that to happen in most groups, at least not at first.

I developed a pretty bad strep infection in my chin which the doctor is treating with an arsenal of antibiotics. There is still a lot of edema in my face, and it is always at risk for infection. I am getting regular massage by a physical therapist trained in lymphedema massage. But even with that, it will probably be a year before the swelling fully subsides.

Still, it’s good to be home and able to go in to work a couple of days a week. Everyone has become so accustomed to my working remotely that I usually have no reason to go in. As a result, I have become a house husband, something Charlotte is enjoying. Every day that I work from home, there is a list of chores for me to do in addition to doing my regular job. And I’m happy to do it. If I ever really retire, I suspect I will have a “honey do” list every day. I don’t mind because it means I have a wife whom I can care for.

So that’s where I am. My life is pretty ho-hum. And that’s just fine with me.

 “You can’t go back home to your family, back home to your childhood … back home to a young man’s dreams of glory and of fame … back home to places in the country, back home to the old forms and systems of things which once seemed everlasting but which are changing all the time – back home to the escapes of Time and Memory.” – “You Can’t Go Home Again.” – Thomas Wolfe

I now have something which seemed like a distant horizon not so long ago. Charlotte and I have airline tickets to Phoenix where awaits my car to finish the journey, my home, my bed, six impossible cats who own my heart, and most of all my wife.

“Home” is a state of mind. It is the place where there is a reasonable expectation that things are as they should be, or at least attainable. I have been in Michigan for most of the summer and early fall, and I am surrounded by people who love me. Everything I need is at my disposal, I want for nothing. I know my way around familiar streets and I notice the unexpected presence of businesses and buildings that weren’t here when this was “home.” But it no longer is. And even if I were to move back here, I could not return to the “home” that I once knew. That state of mind has passed away, as it certainly should.

Home will be found again in our little house in Arizona filled with the things that make it more than a mere dwelling. And I do so long to be back there. And yet, I will not find the home I left. It will certainly become “home” again, but it will never be “. . .  the old forms and systems of things which once seemed everlasting but which are changing all the time.” These are the musings of one whose life has been more than half lived, for whom the inevitability of change has seeped into his very bones.

Is this a melancholy surrender to these feelings? It can be, but it certainly needn’t be. For with the perspective of time and an understanding of the transient nature of all that surrounds us, we can turn forward in anticipation of joys yet to unfold, of loves awaiting our arrival. For those like us whose faith is in God, we can affirm that “it was good, it is good, and good it shall ever be.”

Welcome home.

With peals of thunder punctuated by blinding flashes of light a mother attempts to get her child into bed.”Mommy, I’m scared” he says not surprisingly.”Honey, nothing will happen to you. God is watching over us and nothing bad can happen when God is our protection. Now go to sleep and we’ll see you in the morning.” Mom gets into bed, but a couple of flashes later her son has jumped into bed with mom and dad. “Honey, I told you God was watching over you. Let me take you back to your room. You’ll be nice and safe there.” But, of course, it only takes a couple of flashes and back into their bed he jumps. The scene repeats itself a few more times,and finally mom says, “Honey, don’t you believe that God is watching over you?” “Yes,” he replies. “But right now I could really use somebody with a little more skin.”

This is an old joke but a favorite for one important reason. It’s easy to talk of God’s goodness and protection when things are not terribly frightening, or when they are happening to someone else. But what happens when things get real, when it’s no longer a matter of simply knowing that God cares for us? Sometime, God works in tangible and immediate ways. The rent is due and an unexpected check shows up. You need to hire a replacement for a person that just quit, and you run into someone with the right qualifications looking for a job. We have all experienced moments like that. They can be faith builders, but they aren’t a foundation for faith.

The central fact of Christianity is precisely the punch line of that joke. We need a God with skin. We need a God who took on human flesh so that as human beings, we have a God who knows our infirmities, who knows intimately our deepest fears. And our deepest, most secret fear is that God is an illusion, a story we tell ourselves to feel better. But the little boy in the story wasn’t buying it. He didn’t want a story: he needed real protection.

How, then, do I experience a God with skin? How do I experience the tangible reality of a God who is my protection? Jesus came in the flesh to conquer all sin and death. But that meant that he had to first die. And even though He rose from the tomb, it was still necessary for Him to leave us so that something more powerful could take the place of His earthly presence, limited, as it were, by time and space. What He gave us was more than His risen body. He gave us His Holy Spirit. And it was His intention,, and that of the Father, that those who are baptized into His death are likewise baptized into His life.

So take a moment and look at you hands. If you are a Christian, those are not your hands. They are the flesh that clothes the hands of God. This is not a metaphor. The highest expression of God’s incarnation is that he redeemed our own flesh that it might become His. But we do not experience it unless we use it. The Holy Spirit is power, and power is not dormant. It is only when those hands are animated by the Holy Spirit that the miraculous ensues. The irony, then, is that I am never so close to the protection of God as I am when my hands reach out to protect someone else. God made us for purpose. Not merely a purpose, but purpose itself. As Christians, that means that nothing ever happens outside of the purpose of God.

I am dealing with some very difficult struggles right now. It is Sunday afternoon and a group of friends who stopped by have gone home. It could be the saddest moment of my week. Nothing is easier than self-pity. I could go in my room, close my eyes, and let the tears flow. And there would be nothing inherently wrong in that. But it is less than God wants for me. So I grabbed my computer and did what I could to give the moment meaning. I wrote. And by writing about the reality of my life, perhaps someone else’s life will be touched, or they will touch someone else. After all, what is skin for if not for touching?

I’ve been remiss in holding to my goal of blogging more often. I’ve tried a few times and the words just didn’t seem to come. But tomorrow night will be the last night I go to bed with my speech in this condition and Charlotte will be here and I won’t waste our time together blogging. I don’t know what condition I will be in this time next week, but it will be different.

While I was sharing at the meeting this morning, I came to the realization that the thing I really fear the most is knowing I might never be able to talk to an AA newcomer. It’s hard enough in Arizona even finding new people to sponsor. But if my speaking ability becomes more limited there will be even greater hurdles to overcome. The bright side of that is that, if I am open to the possibilities, God will find a way to use these new developments to reach people I might not have otherwise reached. I just can’t see how, at least at this time.

I have maintained for some time that my strongest natural talent lay in teaching. And when I became a teacher, I found that it was a talent like every other, present in potential but requiring a great deal of practice and humility to properly develop it. I may not be a great teacher, maybe not even a good one. But when I am teaching, I feel that I am in my natural element. Whether I am standing in front of a classroom, or at an AA podium, talking one-on-one or leading a small group, there is no experience to compare to it. When I see a flash of understanding cross someone’s face, I feel like I am doing what I was made to do.

So what do I do if I can’t talk? Obviously I can write, and I certainly plan to, more than ever before. There is on this blog alone years of postings, mostly about the Program but also about my faith and other philosophical areas. And for the most part, it seems no one has read it. Nor need they. I am, after all, just one person expressing his opinions which, while they might be  insightful at times, are mostly syntheses if things I’ve learned from other sources. So my writing eventually flowed to a trickle for one reason only. I want to be heard. That, ultimately, is the source of the joy I find in teaching.

Am I being self-centered? I won’t deny it. Recognition and positive responses make me feel very good about myself. But following one’s true vocation ought to be gratifying. There’s no sin in that if kept in proper proportion. And the apparent loss of one’s vocation can only have a couple of meanings. Perhaps it wasn’t true discernment, just a rationalization of what I wanted to do anyway. In which case, it’s actually a kind of guidance, showing me that I may have missed the mark somewhere. Or it could be a refinement, a deeper expression of what the true vocation is. What I have done up until now may have been a preparation for something more demanding but more fruitful. Or it might just be something that happened and doesn’t require a spiritual analysis. I have no answers.

So this is how I feel: almost to the top of the roller coaster. Frightened, eager and wanting it to be all over. I don’t think I could wait another week. For the most part, I am genuinely content, convinced that God would not have brought me this far to abandon me. But every morning, for a few moments after I wake up but before I really have my thoughts under control, I feel alone and weak and angry and genuinely frightened. Praise God that these feelings don’t last very long. But I do need to be reminded daily just how bad it could be if I were facing this with only my own power.

Once again I am doing something which used to be anathema to me: typing what comes into my head and publishing it without editing. But I can’t afford the luxury of that much time, and I may actually be a little more self-revealing if I don’t try to tidy it up as much. In any case, this is pretty much raw Steve. Let me know what you think.

I don’t have problems. I have opportunities, and some of my opportunities are insurmountable – heard at a meeting.

It is a character trait of mine that my emotions run ahead of my reason. And the surest outcome of that tendency is to permit circumstances to toss me around. Let a storm cloud appear on the distant horizon, and I am already wet. Let a sliver of sunlight emerge, and the world is a perfect place. I strive to be temperate, I may even boast of it at times, but calm, rational acceptance of circumstances is hardly guaranteed.

Today received news that things actually are just as grim as we first thought. I had embraced the unexpectedly sunny prognosis, and have now made myself worse off than before in some ways. In addition to the fear I already faced, I now carry the additional burden of self-inflicted disappointment (not to mention some embarrassment over having celebrated a bit soon).

When I first had a confirmed cancer diagnosis, I resolved to glory in my infirmity. And God certainly seemed to be providing the grace to stare down this obstacle. But as is often the case, the price of grace can be dear. Thus the question becomes “is grace always sufficient for the trial?” Is the true measure of grace always to be found in the depth of the struggle? My theological self says “yes” emphatically, and my scared inner self says “shut up.”  They are not in conflict.

I will continue to proclaim that God is my fortress and my shield. As in the past, I will affirm that Jesus conquered death and that the grave no longer holds the victory. And I will do this with quivering lips because I am weak, as are we all. It is not bravado I wish to show to the world. Rather, it is the inexplicable peace that overcomes it. Don’t think for a moment that I am not frightened. To face something this dire and not be frightened is either insanity or stupidity. But beneath the fear is a joy that no one can take from me. And that joy is rooted in absolute truths: that I am loved and supported by the best people in the word, that the most spectacular woman in the world is my wife, and that God, in His boundless love, will never leave me desolate.

So be by my side as we navigate these “opportunities.” It’s going to be a hell of a ride.

To all my friends that had trouble commenting:

I had the blog set to require moderation of comments, but since I am so lazy it meant that your comments weren’t posting until I got around to it. I activated a plug-in that should prevent spam so if it works, there won;t be any restrictions. If I have problems with spam, I may have to tighten things up a little, but I’ll let you know before I do.

And thanks for all the response to my last post. More will follow. I have a biopsy tomorrow which will give us a better idea of what we’re dealing with. Pray for Charlotte. She’s having a tough time.