Tonight is the one-year anniversary of my mother’s death on the Jewish calendar. She was very observant and lighting a Yarzeit (memorial) candle was something she faithfully followed for her deceased loved ones. Even though I am not religious, I’ve decided that I will do this for my mother.

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I lit a candle and remembered how much she loved me.

These are lyrics from my song “You Were There,” which I wrote for my mother. I recently finished a new vocal for it.

Last week, I had lunch with my friend, Janis. It wasn’t until the next morning that I realized how we hadn’t mentioned anything at all about our mothers; her mother died only five weeks after mine.

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That was so different from our last lunch six months before, where we both talked a lot about our sadness. The fact that we talked about ordinary life instead of our grief seemed like a beautiful sign of healing to me.

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My post title of “When Life Holds Pain” is a lyric line from my song “Rainbow Through My Tears.” I composed that song a year ago and recently decided to sing a new vocal for it.

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When I wrote that song, I was still waiting to see a rainbow representing healing. I feel like I can relate to my song even more now. I am elated that my eyes have been less painful. Even though they are not “normal” like they used to be, I can cope far better with less pain.

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Pain can be intolerable. I’ve learned that maintaining hope of healing has helped me greatly in every discouraging situation I’ve faced in my life.

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I have been watching my close friend, Joni; go through the process of healing. Only two weeks after celebrating her fifty-fifth birthday in July, Joni was in the ER with difficulty breathing. What initially seemed to be pneumonia turned out to be a heart condition. She was told she needed surgery to repair one of her heart valves.

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This certainly upended my dear friend’s life. Before having her surgery, she came out to see me at Kulak’s one night when I performed. That night, her husband took a picture of us hugging.

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Joni has gone through a lot since her surgery. For weeks, she has dealt with constant pain and fatigue – her recovery has been slow and not as swift as she had hoped for.

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Her health crisis came at a time when she was elated to have found a job she loved as a masseuse. She had to quit her job and hoped she could work again. A lot of healing was needed for her to reach that place.

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Last week, I was elated to see that she felt a little better. She had gone on an easy hike and sent me a text message with pictures.

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She wrote, “Outdoors, Yeah! It smells like pinecones melting in autumn sun! Yum.”

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I could tell from her smiling face in the sun that she was healing.

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About two weeks ago, I started to notice that my left leg was aching. I tried to ignore it, but found myself grimacing whenever I stood in my kitchen. I was on one of my “exercise walks” in the late afternoon, when the pain in my leg began to increase. Soon I was gasping and looking for a place to sit down.

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The last thing I wanted to do was go to a doctor. Finally, I realized that since it hadn’t gone away – I couldn’t ignore it anymore.

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I sent a very hesitant email message to my doctor. It was Friday morning and I wrote, “I might come see you on Monday if this pain continues.”

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I was in shock when I received a message back from him only five minutes later. He wrote, “You don’t have to wait; I have some openings this afternoon.”

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His response reminded me what a great doctor he was.

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I took the last appointment available, which was at 4:30. It meant a lot of traffic to contend with, but allowed me to keep my earlier appointment with George, my musical arranger.

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All morning, George and I continued working on a gorgeous new arrangement for my song “Angel in the Sky.” I was fine while working because my leg never bothered me when I was sitting.

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But when I stood up to leave, my leg began throbbing. I was glad I had made that appointment with Dr. Wong.

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The waiting room was deserted. In a few hours it was Halloween night; this was such an eerie time to be at a doctor’s office. I was sure my doctor wanted to get home to trick or treat with his young children.

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I didn’t wait long. Dr. Wong came into the exam room; he was caring and concerned like always. But before I could talk about my leg, I told him I had to share something with him.

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My eyes glistened as I spoke.

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“Dr. Wong, do you remember when I came to you two months ago? I wondered if there was something wrong with me that was causing my dry eyes. I was very overweight and discouraged; I was almost certain one of the blood tests would come back with a result indicating a problem – but everything was normal.”

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I added, “Well you know what really helped me?”

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He asked me what he had done that was so helpful.

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“When you told me that you saw me as a strong person – when I made up my mind, I would be able to lose weight. Your faith in me made a difference. It inspired me to change my habits and I’ve lost about ten pounds since then!”

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Dr. Wong grinned and said, “That’s great! Yes, I did notice your weight loss.”

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I also shared with him how my eyes had improved since I had started drinking a lot of water on a daily basis – it made a huge difference.

Because my eyes are better, I’ve been performing more.

After asking me a few questions about my leg, Dr. Wong told me he wanted a physical therapist to examine me. I was very impressed when only five minutes later a physical therapist came into the exam room.

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She was very thorough and treated me respectfully. After her exam, she said that I had an inflamed femoral nerve in my thigh. How that happened was a mystery, but getting older certainly has led to aches and pains. She recommended using ice and gave me a few exercises and other suggestions to help me deal with my pain.

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I limped back to my car filled with relief that my pain wasn’t anything serious.

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It was now almost dark and I was glad to be going home. I put on the song that George and I had created earlier in the day. It was a perfect opportunity for me to practice my singing. My car swelled with the beautiful notes of the new arrangement for “Angel in the Sky.” I was in heaven with my angel as I sang aloud.

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There was a lot of stop and go traffic on the freeway. It was starting to drizzle and very gloomy; I continued singing.

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Suddenly, I saw a large SUV ahead swerve out of control. It spun into my lane and the car in front of mine smashed into it. I instinctively hit my brakes and thankfully, I wasn’t going very fast.

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My car screeched to a halt only a few inches from the accident. As I was braking, I prayed the car behind me would not rear-end mine. But there was no impact and I had luckily avoided crashing.

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My heart was pounding and the poignant music was still playing as I signaled and carefully moved around the accident.

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I drove home and decided my “angel in the sky” was my “angel on the freeway” at that moment.

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© 2014 by Judy Unger and http://www.myjourneysinsight.com. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Judy Unger with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.