Seasons

“To everything there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven.” - Ecclesiastes

I took on a new client a couple of months ago for what I expected to be a small project, barely worth my effort.  I didn't really want to take this piece of business.  For one thing, it is a French language agency and I don't speak French.  For another thing, the agency director didn't show any indications at the beginning of our interactions that she could recognize personal boundaries.  She sent me text messages from morning through night, seven days a week. One morning I woke to twenty five text messages which she sent in the middle of the night.  I am already immersed in other work and this project looked like a tremendous amount of effort for very little financial reward.  But the friend who sent her my way is a good friend.  His gut was telling him that she really needed help and that I was the person to give it to her.  He was right.

The morning to night, seven days a week texts, emails and calls have not abated.  In fact they have escalated.  Now they don't just come from the agency director but from the agency board and other members of agency management.  They come from the director's friends and supporters.  The director is dying and there is much to do to get things in order before she passes.

In these two months, I have come to love her. I admire her zest for life.  I am awed by the example she has set in taking the life lemons she was handed and making lemonade. She will leave a legacy of love, hope and healing not just for the children she has devoted her life to helping but for all those, like me who have been blessed to know her.

Just two months ago, when I met her, we thought she was getting better.  We believed she had many months, even years ahead.  We now know that is not so.  We count the time in hours and days now.  When we learned that her time was growing so short, I struggled with why God would bring me to her, to love and know only to take her away from me so soon. It is a selfish sentiment.  In this season of her life, she needed me and in this season of my life, I needed her.

A couple of weeks ago, when I went to meet with her at her bedside, she presented me with a Superwoman cape.  It made my heart smile.  As much as I appreciate the gesture, I don't think it is an accurate representation of our roles.  It is she who is Superwoman and I am merely her humble student.