Micro Musing: A Funeral for Normal

I did a thing today. A little step that felt like an admission of failure. Even though I know it wasn’t.

Since my October 2024 knee revision, I’ve slept in a recliner in our memory room (aka living room). Now, before anybody feels too sorry for me, it’s quite snazzy! Zero gravity with heat and massage. Plus, it’s a stand-up chair when I’m ready to tackle the world.

My precious Lovie has slept on the pull-out sofa every night—wanting to be near her Mama. Her cute bed in the loft of her bedroom has been turned into a stuffed animal zoo!

My bed has also received a new purpose, serving as a catch-all table for life’s overflow. Oh, we’ve tried a few times to make the bed work. Two nights, to be precise. But getting onto the bed, pivoting my legs up and over, and then swinging my weight on my hands to scoot to the center caused so much pain on my dying joints. Doing that two to three times a night was just more than I wanted to handle. And did I mention how soft and awesome my recliner was?!?

So today, Dad and I took pictures of my epic adjustable zero gravity bed with its perfectly firm Dream Cloud mattress and adorable Chloe Lux bedding with soft minky lining. Our purpose? To post on Marketplace. The idea is to sell the bed and buy a second power lift recliner for my bedroom.

After the ad was posted, there was a strange sense of loss. A little funeral over a normal way of life being traded for a more accessible one. It’s a better option for me. More comfortable. Safer transfers. Ease of movement. Greater independence. All good things. So why the feeling of loss? Why the twinge in my heart when I saw the ad go live?

Because it’s yet another reminder that my life ‘broke’ in February of 2018. My world shattered with the diagnosis of Avascular Necrosis in both knees. The orthopedic team immediately recommended joint preservation in the form of subchondroplasty (a surgical procedure where a bone substitute is injected into damaged areas to support weakened bone) and a wheelchair to slow joint collapse.

Just days before Christmas of the same year, we found ourselves at Mayo Clinic in Rochester, MN. Nozomi-Dawn experienced snow for the first time. I received the news that AVN was in my hips, too. Over the next years, AVN would be confirmed in 8 of my 12 major joints.

And so today wasn’t about selling a bed. Or even making the decision that I would use a recliner from now on. It was about a little death of the dream of normality. A subtle yet poignant reminder: my life is lived in the shadow of a BlinkBeat.

BlinkBeat™:  An event that occurs in the blink of an eye, leading to significant, lasting changes, often evoking strong emotional responses, and leaving an indelible before-and-after mark on one’s life.

I, and those who love me, now live in that shadow. Ever reminded of all the little losses that accompany this era. The daily griefs that ripple out from my BlinkBeat of 2018.

Parker J. Palmer, a Quaker author and educator, uses the phrase ‘Tragic Gap.’ He invites people to settle into the tension of the way things should have been and the way things really are. He encourages us to enter both pain and hope—fully holding them together. This concept has radically reshaped the way I see human emotion and God’s redemptive plan in a post-sin world.

Isaiah 43:18–19 tolls like the mighty church bells on armistice day—heralding freedom, proclaiming hope:

“Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland.”

Here Isaiah gives us hope after the BlinkBeat. Resounding hope that God isn’t finished—that He is at work on a new life project, uniquely for my good and His eternal glory. A way through the Forest of Uncertainty.

And maybe even a birth of a dream in the midst of many deaths.

Lamentations 3:21–23 reminds us that God’s mercies are fresh each morning. His visions are bursting forth anew.

Even when I can’t see them. Even when the sting of dead dreams still smarts. Even when we sell the bed and opt for a recliner. Even in the little, seemingly trivial, concessions to a life post BlinkBeat. Even then, “I call to mind, and therefore I have hope: The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness.”

I don’t know what little losses might be adding to the ache of your heart this week. But I know the pain of losing your dreams. You’re not alone in the sadness. With the Lord holding us both securely in His loving arms, can I just sit with you? Can we just sit in the ache together…

Acknowledging the grief. And also holding out empty hands waiting to be filled with a new dream. A new stream in our wilderness.

I’m here. Our Lord is here. Will you give yourself permission to join us? His hope awaits. But first, we sit in the holy tension.

And just as Paul and Timothy reached out to encourage the believers at Colossae—many of whom they had never even met in person—I bless you, my dearest wayfarer:

“May the lines of purpose in your lives never grow slack, tightly tied as they are to your future in heaven, kept taut by hope.”

With Grit 'n Grace,

Reflection Questions:

1) What “little funerals” or daily losses have reminded you of bigger brokenness in your own life? 

2) When you read Isaiah 43:18–19, what new thing do you long for God to spring up in your wilderness?

3) What would it look like for you to “sit in the ache” instead of rushing toward answers?