The Cocoon

Published in Decision Magazine © 1988

       I've trapped myself into this one, I complained to myself. if only I had planned ahead...called earlier in the week. 

        NO ONE HOME! seemed to echo back after six or seven rings at the other end of the line.  Each additional attempt at telephone calls began to build my frustration.   

        Only one of several calls had been fruitful, but the people were so busy they could not make the ten-mile trip to pick me up.  The rest of the one-sided attempt reminded me that friends were either at family celebrations or out of town for the holiday.

        I was stranded.  His orders had been strict -- NO DRIVING!  The doctor had sternly advised that the surgery on my shoulder would be useless if I damaged it before it healed.   

        Even the singles' dinner after the morning Thanksgiving service was out of reach.

        Letting out a big sigh, I watched the afternoon breeze wave the palm trees outside my front windows.  The rays of bright sunshine failed to penetrate my loneliness.  

         There, in the middle of a window pane, was a single cocoon, spun while I was away in the hospital. As I watched the wind nudge him back and forth, it seemed as if its own lonely existence mocked my own and that served to only deepen my depression.

         "Thanksgiving," I heard a radio announcer say in the background, "A time of family togetherness...a time of good food, eating, and cheer."            

         I knew he was reading from a script, but I was growing tired of hearing what Thanksgiving was supposed to be like. And I hated him for that.

        I stood there for a long time watching the red second hand of my kitchen clock creep relentlessly around a face that now showed dinner time.  Almost as a matter of habit I pulled a frozen dinner out of the freezer and shoved it into the toaster oven.

          On my way to the easy chair, I finally silenced the announcer before he could start another cheery speal.   There wasn't much on TV and the last thing I wanted to watch was holiday parades and hear about the fun everyone else was having.   

        I plugged in a cassette of Christmas carols.  Perhaps the change of music would take the edge off the holiday blues that threatened to drag me deeper into its clutches.

          Feeling sorry for myself, I dropped with a thud into the chair and allowed the lush music to fill the room.  But the sounds of a choir singing "Joyful, Joyful, We Adore Thee" 

clashed with my present circumstances.  Now I had no where to run. 

        My eyes strayed across the small apartment I loosely called "home."  A madcap array of magazines, books and unopened mail mirrored futile attempts at one-armed housekeeping.                 Plastic hospital equipment and medicine bottles lay strewn across the dinette table.  Dishes overflowed the sink and grew into a mountain on the counter.  A checkbook and calculator made an odd-couple, married to battle the mounting stack of unpaid bills and meager Christmas list.             Even the fish tank gurgled uselessly atop the TV set.  Though filled with water, the last aquatic inhabitant had expired while I was away in the hospital the previous week.

        Then my heart received a jolt which gave birth to deep despair.  Smiling back from a gold-framed picture atop the stereo was a trio of smiling children.  To these kids I would never be more than a part-time parent.  Divorce had ripped apart a family that should be gathered around my table.   

        All of the unanswered "whys" of the past two years clawed at the corners of my mind.  Independence and spiritual confidence fluttered away as that old familiar feeling of being shuffled around on a divine chessboard covered me like a fog.

        Oh, God,...I thought I was past all this!  I thought we had buried these old hurts.  Must this holiday be another time for them to come out and breathe once more?

         As my shirt dampened with tears, a calm voice spoke from within a secret chamber of my heart.  Here in times past, I had often invited the Psalmist to sit and share the anguish of his stormy days.  It seemed as if he were the only one who could understand my bouts with despair as I listened to the agony of his soul.  He was familiar with those paths of hurt I now trod

in the valley of loneliness.   

        And yet the lessons he learned in those hours of personal pain seemed to give me a spark of hope that someday I too would walk in the light; that laughter would again flow from a bubbling heart that had been clogged by rejection and self pity.  Bounding off those tender heart walls, his words now admonished, "Be still...trust...wait."  

        Quietly, and with a gentle overwhelming power, came new words, "Look around you again."   

        Through my tears I focused first on the blue Cookie Monster cookie jar, with bulging black eyes, which commanded the top of the kitchen counter.  One distant Christmas morning it had been a gift from some dear friends.  That same couple had recently expressed their continued concern by visiting me in the hospital. 

        Then there were the curios of a recent trip to Haiti.  Millions around the globe this day would continue to starve without the benefit of even a single crust of bread.  While my TV dinner was no feast, its feisty aroma reminded me I was blessed indeed.

         Even the hospital equipment brought back memories of a room-mate who, following a near fatal car crash, had for seven weeks been strapped in a prison of sheets and traction equipment.  While my injured shoulder was temporarily an inconvenient handicap, this man stood a good chance of never walking again.

        But my tears turned to drops of crystalline thankfulness as I gazed at the bouquet of red, pink and white carnations by the children's picture.  Tiny hands had eagerly delivered them in crumpled green paper to my hospital room.  Almost at the end of their life expectancy, they still seemed to shout, "Daddy, we love you!"   

        My children had never been kept from me.  While my ex-spouse had remarried, dashing all hopes of reconciliation, she had always allowed me to be with my children as often as I could manage.  They still knew their father loved them and I cherished every moment I spent with them.

        As a repentant spirit rose up within me my depression began to flow away with the tears.  "Forgive me, Lord, for complaining.  How easy it is to let my mind feed on the things I do not have.  Forgive me once again for demanding answers to my questions and changes in my circumstances.  I'm sorry for forgetting the promise of Your presence in the midst of difficult times."

        I had discovered, in those few moments, that the very objects which fueled my loneliness were transformed into trophies of God's care and faithfulness.  They had not altered physically, but MY inner focus had changed.  Each one could now be regarded as a stepping stone of growth in Christ since the days I had despaired of life itself.  With voices of another melody, my mementos now sang volumes about God's grace.

         Even that lonely cocoon was not silent as it now hung motionless on the dirty window pane.  The drab twig and silk sarcophagus faced a winter of chilling wind, but life was not dead inside that tiny chamber.  Alone and dormant, it was going through change.  God, in His infinite wisdom, was using the isolation of time to change that ugly caterpillar into a creature of beauty that would one day soar in the glory of spring.

      

       My lips moved as the thoughts of my heart tumbled out.  "God, thank you for my present 'cocoon.'  Help me to keep my eyes fixed on You and Your springtime which lies ahead."

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