A year ago one of our cell phones rang at 6am. Getting a call that early was odd on two counts: 1. we typically don't get calls till late morning since most people know Jon works 2nd shift and 2. it was Jon's dad, which was really strange because he rarely calls (those who know the Hockenbergers will smile at this). Immediately we knew something was wrong. Walt (one of Jon's b-i-l's) had suffered an aortic dissection and was being life-flighted to UofM hospital in Ann Arbor. We remember shock running through our bodies. Our families had never experienced trauma before, so we didn't really know what we should do. Should we gather our things together and drive up to MI or stay at home? We were already planning to go up to MI later that day because it was the weekend of the brother-in-law bike trip. What we ended up doing was lay our heads down together on the pillows and pray.
Through good times, hard times, and traumatic times "Lord, bless us and keep us. Make your face to shine upon us and give us peace!" We've got a Father that holds the world in His hands and nothing can happen unless he wills.
Walt has been recovering for the past year. There are new restrictions that he is getting used to, but his faith has been strengthened and God is using this experience in his life to help others walk with Him.
I've been in several scary basements before. Most notorious is my Grandma Butcher's. To access the only shower in her house, you have to navigate down rickety stairs next to a damp Ohio sandstone wall. If you safely make it that far, you have to search in the dark with your head down (because it is just over 5ft high) to find the single light bulb string located in the rear of the basement. As a child, even seeing the lincoln logs at the bottom of the stairs didn't entice me to walk down her stairs on my own.
Our house is pretty old and the rotting, tilting basement stairs show it. So this weekend we got out the sawzall and started to remedy the problem. After removing the stairs and pouring a concrete pad, we added a special touch with the stones we collected along Lake Superior. Hopefully it will make it a little less scary to walk down there...once the stairs get built back up. The missing stairs did cause a little excitement though. About ten minutes after we were all done with the concrete Winston slipped through the kitty door and committed to running down the stairs before he realized they were missing. I flipped the light on just in time to see him sprawled with his front paws on the wall, back paws on the top ledge, and tummy drooping between them. It would have been a great picture to capture and then add quarter size goggle eyes to emphasize his surprise. He was past the point of recovering so he jumped down and permanently added his prints to the wet concrete...oh well, it added character to the design.
