Surreal Anniversary

It's Friday morning.

Another "anniversary" day.  This one is different again.  2 years ago today I was walking the stations of the cross in a monastery garden in Malta.  That walk had some interesting and far reaching results.  That day remains one of the more surreal experiences in my memory.

Have you ever seen the scene from one of the first seasons of Grey's Anatomy, where there's an unexploded bomb in a guy, and Meredith is in the operating room, and the others are scattered around the hospital trying to figure out what to do with themselves in the midst of this crisis?  Izzie has the totally opposite stress reaction to what would be normal, and is finding everything hilariously funny, even the things that are so very not funny.

That day two years ago was like that.  In fact, I remember calling that scene from Grey's to mind in the midst of that day. 

I laughed in a panicked, I"ve completely lost it kind of way that day, sitting in a private chapel that we'd been invited into.  It's that somewhat crazed laughter that really sticks out.  That I'd hit a breaking point after four weeks of crazy experiences, and the completely surreal nature of the events of that day just struck me as funny.  It took some time to control that laughter.

There were tears later, and fear.

Laying on my face in that same little chapel, only moments later.

A meeting of eyes that is burned in my memory.

A moment where I sensed God asking something of me, and I simply didn't, couldn't comply.  That moment has taught me much, and has been the source of silent "what if's?" ever since.

Today I remember a walk to the cross, a tiny puppy named Simon that shaped all of us who were there, the exposure of hidden things, and laughter.

Because looking back, there is something incredibly funny in just how surreal that day really was.

One day I'll share the whole story.  But today, today I'm just remembering.  Grieving a little, and laughing a little too.