Autumn

Sunday I decided to visit my friend Subrina Oliver's daughter, Autumn Highsmith at Helen Hayes Rehabilitation Hospital. The last time I saw Autumn was five days after she was critically injured by a car, walking from her summer job. It happened a few weeks before her return to college to begin her senior year. On the first visit, everything about Autumn was tentative and unstable, except her mother. I recognized in the eyes of Subrina, the gaze I once owned, having walked the same path six years earlier with my own son. Nonverbally her eyes greeted everyone with, "I know what I see, I know what they say, but I know what I believe and unless you are joining me with the same focus, DO NOT COME UP IN HERE, because I will devour your vital organs and pick my teeth with your spleen."

We joined in prayer during the initial visit for Autumn and Nicholas, another young man in ICU also critically injured in a car accident.

In the days following my visit, I've been encouraged anticipating Subrina's updates on Autumn's progress. Often amused by the scholastic explanations of her Facebook posts, knowing the medical personnel are under rigid scrutiny. Many times I would giggle pondering on how these doctors never anticipated they would have the tremendous weight of answering to a mother with a PhD. in the STEM field. I wondered how many times they did rock, paper scissors to decide who would report to her first.

Now five weeks later, I enter Autumn's room, she is sitting up with a neck brace smiling with her friend who is also visiting. I introduce myself, because although her mom and I have been friends for about twelve years, Autumn and I have never met. She greets me so warmly. Her face is in tact! I don't see any bruising, scarring, swelling, deformity or facial evidence of the trauma that had her unrecognizable on my previous visit. The visual that had me crying once I was out of her mother's sight, in the elevator, in the parking lot, in the car and all the way home from Nassau Medical Center.

Now not only is she smiling and beautiful, that girl can talk! She is telling me about her therapy to learn to feed herself and cognitive functions, which are her words not mine. She explained that both her knee caps are fractured and anxious for the cast to come off of her arm. I learned how long she has to use the brace for her spine and being assisted to use the bathroom. I was informed how she pulled out her trach before her transport to the rehab center and how she hates the puree liquids she is fed and would much rather pizza, or macaroni and cheese, anything except what they were giving her and oxtails because she absolutely can not stand oxtails! I told her so many people have been praying for her and seeing her so bright and functioning is very exciting to me. She responds with, " Thanks so much for praying for me. So many people have supported me. I even heard my friends have been praying for me. That makes me glad because you know, they are not like prayerful people." Her visiting friend and I laugh at the term "prayerful people."

We chat some more about how when she graduates with her degree in psychology she would like to enter the forensic field or human services. She shares dreams, laughter and that she wants to go home! I hear the voice of a normal twenty-one year old with brains and grit she obviously inherited from her mama. She accepts my offer for a prayer before leaving. I remain poised and cool because I didn't want her to reject my future visits if I showed how I really felt like shouting, "Hallelujah" and praying in tongues or worse I didn't want these millennials to record my antics and it goes viral on YouTube.

While driving home from a trip that should of been 1 hour and 45 minutes, with bridge delays, broken traffic lights and irritated officers directing cars, it turned into 2 hours and 30 minutes. There was a lot of time to think. The phrase Bishop D'Onofrio shared in a sermon, "God didn't cause it, but He will use it", echoed my entire drive. Autumn' s accident now had "not like prayerful people" seeking God and seeing Him answer in their friend's recovery. My walking through a similar accident would hopefully allow another mother to see that full recovery is possible. There was also the petition that in this situation faith would supersede the knowledge of science and religion and birth a permanent relationship with a loving and attentive Lord. It allowed me to remember that storms are traumatic, intense, unfair, severe and the outcomes are not a predictable variable but God will always carry you through if you let Him. I prayed that after this crisis was over and the normalcy of their days resumed and perhaps Subrina irritates Autumn to her core over some parent/offspring conflict, she would forever remember and be grateful for her "ride or die" and honor her mother.

Then I reflected on a tried and true life formula. If you are going through something, anything at all hunt for someone to help or encourage. Deliberately seek to sow your time and faith where you desire to yield the greatest reward. It is a guaranteed mood booster. God didn't cause it, but He will use it.