Skip to main content

The Quiet place.







Every once in a while you want to carry on through the corridor ,stroddle the two steps onto the bridge but stop just ten yards before the cafeteria into a heavy door on the wall which reads ‘Quiet room’.In the action filled acute medicine setting it helps to spend a portion of your lunch break beyond that wooden door.It is a chapel of sorts,a room to be exact.Carpetted but with very sparse furniture.A lectern with a bible,a side table which holds church addresses,brochures for church activities,small booklets on various subjects like bereivement,etc.
As you scour the place what really strikes you is the board .It has flaps of tiny hand-written prayer requests,cards ..people who have just poured their hearts out to ‘you will not believe ,who?’.It is letters to Jesus.
One of them reads , ‘Dear Lord Jesus,please be with my eighty year old mother who is having a hip replacement.She has never been to a hospital before.Please look after her and help her to heal.’Sam
Another one reads,’Dear Jesus,I have lost my son John to a road traffic accident and it is extremely difficult for me and especially my wife to understand why this has happened.Please help us as we go through this sad time.Please help my mother who is devastated by this loss.I feel helpless.’James Thomas.
‘Dear Jesus,my wife and I have been blessed with a tiny baby girl who decided to be born premature.She is fighting to breathe well and in an incubator.Please keep her safe. Love Jerry.
Dear Jesus,I want to thank you for blessing my sister with a lovely baby girl.I love U.Tabitha .
Then there are others addressed to God.
Dear God ,I lost my temper with the staff in the ward no ...today.I thought they were careless in the way they handled my son’s linen.Please help me not to get angry with them and help me to forgive them.I am sorry.Rita.
Dear God ,Thank you,thank you thank you..so much........for looking after Herbert through the difficult surgery.Muah .....Liz.
I kneel down on the carpet and say a prayer for Liz,Rita,Tabitha,Jerry,James and Sam.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Image of Christ.

 There is nothing more scarier than a heart that has hardened .I was talking to Mary the other day,infact weeping with her There is a deep restlessnessness inside.Thank God for it becuase it shows that I have not resigned myself to the way things are.I was telling her I miss the deep experience of seeing the image of Christ and the compassion of the Holy spirit which just used to overwhelm  my heart when I saw the image of Christ in people ,situation and the creation. What is the image of Christ?It is a body marred and maimed to bear the sin of the world.it is a voice that did not speak in protest against God the father,who actually planned it all before the creation of the world,not against the people who maimed Him ,flogged Him,drove the nails into His hands and feet to satisfy their sinful nature.The image of Christ is a body broken  to the utmost yet given to feed the very same people .It is a love that did not count the cost. I am a person who does not put too much v...
20 comments
Read more

Gift of Life...

  I  realise  I am a beauty junkie. Always on the lookout for the experience that brings tears of awe to your person. I guess it is all right because there is just one life to live and as would have it I would like to live it to the fullest.I  have travelled a bit and I have a whole bucket list unticked yet.Some things I call it my short life,I still cherish forever. I have had the experience to meet up and get close to exceptional people ,some of them extremely rare species who stick out from the crowd. One such friend during my early years just looked across the bench to me and said something which has stuck with me forever. Having been to Auroville in Pondicherry, one suddenly exclaimed,' There is a glass crystal in Auroville, when the sunlight falls on it  it reflects the light beautifully and it is breathtaking to say the least. You should see it.The crystal reminded me of you.'I have not seen that crystal till date but I remember the eyes of the person whe...
1 comment
Read more

Just Listening.....

All of eighty and delirious ,the old Pandit shuflled for his Janeu(Sacred ceremonial thread according to hinduism which the brahmins tie around their person).Two devoted sons tried to wrestle him down to his bed.He had a diaper on ,and a catheter but was insisting deliriously that he wanted to use the toilet.Suddenly he picked up his thread and put two loops around his ear.The sons interpreted that he wanted to pass stool.This was a learning for us. Another time another man in his eighty came in screaming with chest pain.He had extensive anterior wall MI .My junior colleague managed him well.His ST elevation had reverted ,his pulse rate was well controlled and he was comfortably seated by the time we saw him for the morning rounds.By the afternoon he complained of chest pain and then went into a supraventricular tachycardia but his hemodynamics held, so we medically managed him.He was by nature a comfortable man.He shared that he was ready to die.We got talking to him one afternoon.He ...
1 comment
Read more