What's Really Important

First of all, THANK YOU for all the well wishes I've received by text message, email and Facebook.

I wish I could tell you what happened to me in the last 24 hours, but I'm still drawing a blank.  I remember taking our foster son to the park to play with some friends.  I remember filing an application for an attorney.  I remember watching a video or two on the Far Between web site.  Apart from that, the first thing I really have any clear memory of in the past day was waking up in the emergency room at about 1 a.m., with my husband Göran and our dear friend Peggy by my side.

What I am told is that, around 5 p.m., some good Samaritan found me face down on a sidewalk, toppled over my bike, on the south side of a public park adjacent to our home.  I was covered in blood and had a major gash on my head which the doctors have since stapled together.  (Staples?  Really?  Actually, I have some vague memory of the doctor telling me he was about to staple my head.  But I don't remember much anything of the actual experience itself.)  The man who found me walked me home with my bike, and then I called my husband Göran on my cell phone.  Göran called the ambulance.  The stranger who found me stayed until help arrived, and wrote his name and phone number on a piece of paper before he left.  I'm telling you all this because this is what people told me happened.  I don't remember any of it at all, even though everyone assures me I was quite loquacious through the whole experience.

Our son Glen and his boyfriend Will had spent time doing vigil with Göran and our friend Peggy in the hospital.  (I think I remember Glen crying by my bed side.)  He and Will later went home to pick up our other foster son (who was staying with a next door neighbor) and keep an eye on him and put him to bed while Göran remained behind with our friend Peggy.

They did a CAT scan on me from head to toe.  (I vaguely remember being carted to the CAT scan machine, and being awkwardly moved by the nurses from the gurney to some pads in front of the machine.)  I had a concussion.  They discovered a cyst around my spleen, which at first they were going to hospitalize me for, and possibly do immediate surgery.  Further study of the CAT scans revealed, however, that the cyst was not accident-related, and was not as urgent as they thought.  Once I was awake enough to stand up, the doctor prescribed heavy-duty painkillers and said I could go home -- but ordered me to bed rest for the next week or two.

Trust me.  I'm horizontal typing this.

I was dreaming before I woke up.  In my dream, Göran and I had learned that we were going to be able to adopt our foster son.  I was also in some kind of process, petitioning my Stake to reinstate my membership in the Church.  Göran says I was talking virtually the whole time I was in the emergency room with them, though I don't remember any of this.  I was telling our friend Peggy about our trip to California, and the wonderful time we had at Circling the Wagons.  One of the first things I remember from waking up was saying: "I wish I weren't excommunicated from the Church."

I guess I could be dead.  I could be seriously incapacitated, or in a coma.  The doctors tell me my memories from the last 24 hours may or may not come back.

The first really strong emotion I felt was just gratitude.  Apparently I'm OK.  I woke up surrounded by family and friends, eventually learning of a barrage of well wishes and offers to help on Facebook.

I don't know if this will sound odd for me to say, but I woke up feeling the Spirit, reassuring me that I was cared for and everything would be OK.  I woke up knowing that life is precious, and that what is most precious in life is family, friends and faith.  I never felt abandoned by God.  If anything, I felt sustained by him.  I have one fleeting memory of flying through the air, and thinking that word: "sustained."

My wish not to be excommunicated is a wish to have my outward relationship with the Church rectified to match the inward relationship I feel with God.

I do remember a kind of darkness too, and thinking I was close to death, and thinking if death came now, I was ready.  Maybe even eager to see what is on the other side, because I trust it is marvelous.

But really, I have a son to raise now, and my husband isn't ready to let me go.  And I wept tears of joy realizing that we were still together as a family.  I was weeping when I woke up, at the thought of adopting our foster son.

I wanted to post a picture of myself, to prove to you all that I am all right.  I took a picture on my iPhone of me grinning, with gauze bandages wrapped around my head like some sort of turban.  I remember seeing it for the first time in a mirror at the emergency room, and -- still groggy -- saying something goofy like: "I look like one of those Jewish ladies in Miami."  Göran absolutely forbade my posting any such picture.  So you will have to take my word for it.  I am here grinning, happy to be still among you.