Tuesday, April 20, 2010

Unexpected Surprises

Well the last twelve hours for me have been full of things that I thought would never happen. To start, once again I couldn't sleep, so like any other person I was fooling around on facebook, and maybe even doing a bit of facebook stalking, but I will never tell ;)
When I had finally decided that enough was enough and that as a normal member of society I had to stop this terrible sleep cycle I was in so that I could wake up before after noon, I got up, turned down the volume of my TV, flipped off my light and crawled into bed. Even though I was still not tired, I knew that in order to function the next day that this was right thing to do.

Being the jumpy paranoid little girl I am however, I continued to hear all the things that go bump in the night. Seeing as it was extremely late, (or early) I felt justified in my fear, and decided it wouldn't hurt anyone if I turned up my TV a bit louder so that I could ignore the imaginary intruders.

When I turned around to lay back down however, I saw a pair of eyes staring at me through the crack in the door!!

Before I let my panic rise up withing me, I took a brief assessment of the situation, and was greeted with the notion that these eyes are shorter than me, and that this may in fact not be an intruder. When my eyes adjusted, I saw those eyes were attached to a cute nose and short blonde hair. Then I heard it. A sweet little girl's whisper. "Nana?"

My little sister had had a nightmare, and just wanted a hug. Soon she had weaseled her way under my covers and in my arms, and of course I had no idea how she had gotten there. Resigned that this little planner wasn't going anywhere, I pulled out the trundle from my bed, popped it up and told her to scoot over. I wasn't bothered by the fact she was here, but I knew that all hope was lost for a good night's slumber for she is a loud sleeper.

Just as I was mourning the loss of any shot at rest, my sister reached over, grabbed my hand and whispered "Nana, you are the best sister in the world. When I grow up, I want to be just like you. I love you." And with that, she closed her eyes and fell right asleep, still holding my hand.

I'm not one to cry normally, but this brought tears to my eyes. For years I had questioned my caliber as a sister, as I have feel I just walk in and out of my siblings lives because I move all over the place. This however, showed me that my love for them has not gone unnoticed, and is indeed enough. I may not be perfect, but my love for them is.

Several hours later when I woke up, it wasn't my sister that was next to me, but my precious brother. He was content to just eat his cookies and drink his milk while he watched Niho Kilan on my TV. When I rolled over and he saw I was awake, he didn't get excited or anything but that is his nature. He just looked at me and said "Hey Nana, I'm glad you're up now."

After playing some Mario Kart with him... and ashamedly getting my butt kicked by a four year old... I went to check my phone, for it hadn't gone off al day which was shocking. I by no means consider myself popular, but I do get regular calls from my best friend Katie. When I got to it, I noticed that it was dead, so I promptly went to go plug it in. Once I had turned it back on, I saw that I had two voicemail. Feeling slightly out of character I decided to check them. I never check my voicemail... EVER. But today I felt that I should.

The first message was from my friend Taylor (HEY TAY) out in Cali, and it totally made me smile, his voicemails always do. When he had finished rambling and singing and rapping the next message clicked on. I could barely understand it, and almost dismissed it as a wrong number. However, I heard my name at the end so I took the phone off speaker, pressed re-play and listened again. When I figured out who it was I was SHOCKED. It was my dear friend Timothy in Nigeria, whom I had worked with for several weeks when I went to his country. It has been four years since I had heard his voice, and this was the first phone call I had ever received from him. Once again I was brought to tears by the message. He told me that him and his family are praying for me, and they hope to catch me on the phone sometime next week.

The only thing I could think, was that they are praying for me??? I am sitting in a beautiful house, playing Wii and typing on my mac book and you wre praying for me? Images from what I had seen in his country flashed through my mind and I was ashamed of myself. Ashamed that I had lost sight of what is important. Instead of worrying about sleep, I should worry about the little girl next to me. Instead of worrying about not having enough money when I know there is plenty in my account, I should be worried about those who have none, and instead of being consumed with prayers for myself and those immediately around me, I need to remember the big picture. There's more to life then what my little mind can conceive, and realizing that was surely the most unexpected surprise of them all.

3 comments:

  1. Read it...loved it! Thanks for the shoutout! :)

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  2. Loved it too! I totally would have been creeped out by Faith's eyes too- lol

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  3. Thanks for reading Tay and Ambie!! And yeah.. TOTES freaked out by that lol

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