When Life Gave Me Lemons, God Sent Me A Cat

Until 2009 I had great plans for my future. The next 20+ years of my life planned out. I had a job I loved and at peace with my home life as a single mother with a 26 year old daughter. I was naïve to the reality that 2009 would age me twenty years.

Sometimes it's difficult to understand God's will.

January 23,2009 was one of the worst days of my life. I was awakened by two of my dogs barking at someone knocking on my front door. It was shortly after 4 p.m. and I'd slept most of the day after working the previous night at Self Regional Healthcare. I was a safety officer under Security at the hospital.

My daughter Laura came out of her bedroom at about the same time I came out of mine. I was shocked to look out the kitchen window and find uniformed sheriff's deputies at the house across the street. I live in a very good neighborhood and couldn't imagine why the police were on my road. She called our closest neighbor Annie to make sure she was safe.

Annie was SCREAMING! So Laura ran over there and came running back crying.

Annie's 15 year old son Shane was killed in a wreck on his way home from school. He was less than a mile from home and he was ejected and the vehicle landed on top of him. Our neighbor across the street was with him and only suffered minor injuries. He was wearing his seat belt. Shane wasn't.

Shane was like the son I never had. He did a lot of yard work for me. He wasn't the type to sit inside in front of the TV all day like a lot of young people are. He enjoyed working on cars and being outside with his friends. Everyone loved Shane. To this day I've never heard a negative comment against him.

His death both destroyed our neighborhood and brought us all closer. I would like to say I understand God's will in all of this. That would be a lie. I don't understand it at all. There is an empty place in our hearts that will always be there. We can pretend to the world that we're happy but we're not. We can smile for pictures but the smile doesn't reach our eyes. I don't know if any of us will ever recover. The most we can do is strengthen seat belt awareness and the danger of speeding.

The next blow came in late March. I was permanently laid off from my job as a safety assistant at Self Regional Healthcare in Greenwood, SC. The hospital had a new CEO and the first thing he did was cut the staff by 200 people. Some had been employed by the hospital for almost 30 years. This was my dream job. I began as a security guard employed by Allied-Barton security in September 2006. I was hired to sit at a desk to help lost visitors and to walk the halls checking for trespassers.

My first clue that God had plans for me was during the time I spent at the 3rd floor desk.The amount of people who would stop and talk to me at my desk near the Critical Care unit was unreal. There was an empty chair by my desk and people would stop and sit with me. I did a lot of listening on that floor. Sometimes people facing the death of a loved one need to have someone neutral to talk to. I was that person. Fellow employees thought I was strange because I cared about these people. Many of them just sat at the desk and ignored everyone unless they HAD to speak.

Self Regional had three rooms on the 3rd floor where they allowed family of the seriously ill to sleep at night. Many nights my chair was occupied by someone unable to sleep. I helped them as best I could. Sometimes by listening; sometimes by offering to bring back food from the cafeteria. Many were relieved to learn pacing the hallway was allowed. It's hard to sleep when a loved one is down the hall dying. I shared the experience of losing my mother. The people who came to sit by me needed compassion-not false promises that their loved one would pull thru. Most people know when the end is near for someone they love.

Allied-Barton had signed a one year contract with Self Regional. I was terrified when the rumors started that I'd be without a job. I'm a single mother and my daughter had been unable to work due to health problems. If was a relief when the hospital hired several of the guards(including myself) on as safety assistants.

Part of my duties in this new position was to monitor the emergency room visitors desk and control access. It was a challenging job and involved keeping track of how many visitors were in with a patient and which rooms weren't allowed visitors at all. Self Regional was the first job I've ever had where God placed me where I was needed. It was also the one I wanted to retire from.

The general public may not know there is a code used next to an ER patients name. This tells the severity of the patients condition. Magenta was the worst. There was always a chaplain involved with a magenta status. Sometimes the chaplain or minister was the only one allowed with a magenta case. I learned to use these men of God to keep family updated. I genuinely cared about the visitors, patients and staff at this hospital.

I shrugged God's plan at this time. I couldn't see how one person could make a difference in anyone's life. My main concern at the time was keeping the visitors happy and holding onto my job.

To understand how God placed me in this hospital I need to explain how I react to things. I'm highly empathic. I pick up on the moods of others and have done so since I was a small child. Here I was being near the Critical Care area and death. I was worried when I accepted the position on how I would react being so close to where people-a LOT of people-died. Then add the ER where all kinds of chaos is taking place.

It was demanding-but I thrived. My mood behind the visitors desk had a direct impact on how visitors behaved in the lobby. I learned to watch the crowd. Sometimes I could sense someone getting worse because of the long wait involved. There were many times I ran to the storage cabinet in a front treatment room and brought a cold rag or a throw up pan to someone in the waiting room. It wasn't part of my job to do this, but the staff all knew what I was doing when I flew thru the door. They were understaffed and I like to think I helped. A few people did ask me why I wasn't afraid of getting sick. I replied "God won't let me get sick when I'm helping others." I was right. I NEVER caught any of the viruses that filled the waiting area. At times there were 50 people waiting to be seen and 30+ already in the exam area.

I made lots of coffee for visitors, doctors, nurses and other staff. If an ER staff member couldn't come out for coffee I'd take a cup to them.I talked constantly. If I couldn't allow a person back with their family,I could take their mind off of things using my greatest talent-MY BIG MOUTH! I could steer a conversation from facing death to gardening in 3 sentences. I believed I was a valuable employee.

Being valuable doesn't meant squat in a depression. So here I was in late March of 2009 losing my job, insurance, disability coverage and all of my dreams of retiring at the grand old age of 90. I LOVED this job. So now I get to live on $200 a week until I find something else. People are holding onto jobs in this recession. Any job is better than nothing. I've been out of work over a year now.

In May I attended the funeral of my mother's sister Clara. She was buried the day before Mother's Day. My daughter and I were reunited with family we hadn't seen in years. My cousin Bruce had been there for me in 2001 when I lost my own mother. I wanted to be there for him. He can take a lot of the credit for my newly found writing ability,

Losing my job was bad. Attending my aunt's funeral was worse. My ex being terminally ill with lung cancer was almost unbearable.. God provided for Archie and for me. Archie needed my presence during his last month. Especially the last two weeks he spent at Rainey Hospice House. I had the opportunity to be with Archie at the end of his life. I held his hand while he died. Hospice even provided me with three meals a day so I didn't have any out of pocket expenses for food. I had an internet connection for job searching, cable TV and a couch to sleep on.The hospice employees are truly angels.

The entire situation would have been a nightmare if I'd held a job during the month he died.Once again I praise God for putting me at the right place at the right time. I lost Archie at 6 a.m. on October 29, 2009.

On November 3, 2009, the day of Archie's funeral, God sent me a kitten. For more on Furby and my experience with Archie please see my hub at http://hubpages.com/hub/Archies-Last-Six-Months.

Don't ever ask "What else can go wrong?"

My car died two weeks after Archie. The clutch cable broke, then the alternator died. I didn't have the money to repair either. My cousin Barbara came to take me wherever I needed to go. My cousin Tommy agreed to fix my car once we had a weekend with clear weather. I feel l'm personally responsible for 8 weekends with bad weather. My neighbor Annie took my daughter to the store when we needed things. They're as close as sister's. As it turns out, Barbara and I have a lot in common. I feel I have a new big sister now. The whole car problem has led me to my new best friend. Thank you Barbara. You are truly an angel. Furby agrees with me.

During the summer and early fall I added a lot to my family tree. In late November, the software I was using quit working on my computer. I had no way to reinstall it as my CD drive was broken. I didn't lose my work. Only the ability to add more to it without complications.This was one of the few things holding me together.

In December of 2009 I began writing about Furby. I was doing a lot of searching for a job on the internet and somehow stumbled across the website pictures-of-cats.org. As a former "cat lady" I felt right at home. I began submitting articles about the cats I've owned in the past. Since December I've published more than 50 stories. My writing and photography skills have improved dramatically.

I now believe that nothing in life is a coincidence. God took away the family history to free up the time for me to write my stories. He took away my transportation to bring me closer to my dad's side of the family.

God has filled my brain with so many stories. People have always told me I should write for a living. Perhaps they're right. The way God is leading me is amazing. And nerve wrecking. He even controls the search engine on my computer and leads me where to publish each story. I pray this is all leading to a career in photojournalism.

I've learned a lot of new skills this year. I can now set up a web site in a matter of hours. I can copy, paste, link, drag and drop. I've also added a lot of information to my family tree. I'm experienced enough to call myself an expert in the genealogy field.

A few months back I realized Furby was sent to me for a reason. I've built an entire site around him. It can be found at http://www.furbytheferalfeline.shutterfly.com. I've also developed a fan page for him on Facebook. Why all of this for a cat? Because God is using my cat to spread his word.

I would like to add how amazing Furby is. Already he has lived thru more pain than many people endure in a lifetime. From having a bot fly larvae in his neck, lancing an abscess, ear mites and now neutering. Yet this little cat appreciates everything that's given to him. We could all learn a few things and appreciate what God has given us. No one ever said life would be easy.

There are a lot of people in the world who will walk away from someone praising God. These same people will listen to a cat. My shutterfly site for Furby has an inspirational page where I tell my stories of how God is leading me blindfolded down the next path in my life. It's all coming full circle. My stories of God's love and my faith are linked from the hubpages site to the Furby site. The inspirational page also has photographs of God's beautiful clouds.

God gave me another "command" on what I need to do next, I've ordered Furby a beautiful emerald collar. I've also ordered a cross for him to wear on that collar. God sent me Furby and everyone should know he is a special creature of God. So if you view pictures of my cat in the not too distant future, you will know why he wears a cross.

God is even picking my Facebook friends these days. I've chosen a few myself by surfing Facebook. They majority show up unexplained. They are the one's God would approve of and that's enough for me.

In closing I'd like to say I should be terrified of the future. Unemployment compensation doesn't last forever and the world is physically falling apart. Somehow I think everything will work out in the end. My faith has grown stronger instead of weaker.

I refuse to allow Satan to wear me down.