A Helping Hand

Sometimes, we all need a friend to lend a helping hand.

For the last few months, I've been honored to have two of them - Ian and Tom - who have come to help at the castle pretty regularly.

There's still a lot of work to be done there, the remains-to-be-done list is dauntingly long, and I tend to get overwhelmed and begin to believe it's NEVER GOING TO GET DONE!!!!!, no matter how hard I work at it.

Then Tom shows up on Friday morning and we pick a spot to work on for the day. He is cheerful and brings a great attitude with him every time he shows up. He's also good at fixing stuff. He's the reason the trash is gone from the house and garage. He'd show up at 7:30 and we'd haul buckets until around lunchtime. It's not that I'm incapable of hauling buckets on my own, it's that company makes the job go much faster. His willingness to tackle the mess made the piles seem smaller from the get-go. This past week was the first one where there were no remaining rooms of trash to be emptied - it felt odd to not have to dig out the wheelbarrow and buckets. (Instead, we took down all the broken windows for repair.)

Ian has also been showing up most weeks. He has zero experience working on a house, but is willing to do the grunt cleanup work that needs doing. He's peeled most of the wallpaper from the entry hallway, a necessary and tedious first step in being able to repair the walls. He's washed down woodwork, helped me clean up the garden, and last week, started cleaning a good decade's worth of dust and lost items out of the main bedroom radiators. (Sunglasses, old photos, and an old pill bottle were the most noteworthy finds.)

They freely give of their time and talent, asking nothing in return.

They remind me there was life before the isolation of COVID-19. My people are still there, I will get to laugh and eat and sit freely with them again one day, God willing.

They remind me not everyone is only in it for what they can get - sometimes, some people show up just to see what they can give.

They remind me progress, slow, steady progress, is being made. When they show up each week, and properly admire the work that's been done in their absence, it gives me before and after markers and I can see that, yes, I am not where I was yesterday. And, since I know they're coming, it give me motivation to be sure to have something done I can show therm.

The grace they've brought cannot be commanded or earned; it can only be freely given.

I don't feel worthy of their gifts, but I sure do appreciate them.