Friday Five: Asking for Help

Friday Five: I Ask for Help

This time last Friday I was on my way to the airport to pick up your usual host for first Friday Five. We had a mighty to-do list for the Labor Day weekend, and her accomplishments were so far beyond impressive as to be heroic. A dumpster is now full of water-damaged junk from my basement.

This was not a job I could have accomplished by myself. I had to ask for help.

I hate to ask for help. I love to give it. You may identify with these feelings.

So, for this Friday Five, please list four ways you have been helped when you didn't want to ask for it and one way you had a chance to help that meant a lot to you.

If you know how to link to your post, God bless you, and if you don't, I promise to visit you anyway. And if you have a minute, leave a thank you to kathrynzj, the heroine mentioned above, who is retiring from Friday Five.

This could not be more appropriate for me today.  Songbird, sorry for your emergency. Praying that things are right for you. But you came very close to home as I opened my  mail this morning.  I am now sitting watching my friends carry boxes to my new home.

Two and a half weeks ago J and I were in a serious car accident.  Both of us were banged up.  I have a separated shoulder and cracked ribs; J.  has just had neck vertebrae fusion and can only carry very light loads.  And we were scheduled to move this weekend.

I have never seen a bunch of people gang together in a parish as we have seen from St. Martin's.

1.  We have had at least 20 people who have packed up our 3 bedrooms of house.

2  It is over 100 degrees today and at 3 guys with trucks are schleping the boxes and 4 gals with vans or SUV's are loading up our clothes, furniture etc.

3. Two families have brought us meals (gluten-free) that were so tasty after spending days packing.

4.  A young woman from our upstate NY connections has moved in with us to help us for a year.  She was out of work and couldn't find a job so we invited her here.  She has pitched in and is shouldering great responsibility as we move:  helping us chart the repairs that need to be made to the new house, going to the hardware store to get things that are needed, etc.

5.  I am pleased that we have extended this invitation to T. as she joins our community for a year. She is willing to help us with household chores while we pay for room and board.  It is easier to find work here in TX than it is in the rust belt so that she can save for college tuition.  She has already made some connections with members of our parish in order to discuss just what kind of nursing she wants to pursue and how the best way to pay for it.

Bonus:  Years ago I learned how to ask for help.  And I have learned that by doing so, I find that it keeps me humble (a hard thing for a Texan) and it keeps me aware of the needs of others.  The reciprocity of helping is the glue that makes for a generous community.  That is what has happened in this parish I belong to.  We give and take because we know we can depend on one another without either asking too much or feeling put upon.  I give lots of my time to this parish that is unpaid.  They give back to me their concern, their prayers their help and their love.  I can't ask for any more.  When I am mended, I will make casseroles, or pack homes, or plan someone's funeral simply because I know that so much was done for me.  It isn't "tit for tat."  It is just love and it feels so good.  It is this kind of caring that dispels the fear of growing old without a family to 'take care of me.'  It reminds me that God is generous and the generosity that God shows me is something that I can return.

Thanks, Martha for today's Five.  Hope things have gone well.