The economy was collapsing, I had lost my job and my
previous employer was laying people off. I applied for a job with the Census
Bureau.
In the spring I was trained and sent out as a
per-census canvasser. I was working a familiar neighborhood when
A former acquaintance came out to say hello. She
walked with me as I made my way around the block. She told me she had lost her
husband in November and felt lonely and lost. It’s hard for her to get around
and she has to take the bus if she has to get anywhere. She didn’t have a car
and she doesn’t drive.
I said why didn’t you call me and she said she
didn’t want to both people.
I said, “Don’t
feel bad asking for help. That’s why God put us on earth to help one another.
He would have stopped at one if he didn’t mean for us to take care of each other.
Besides, when you ask someone for help you are actually doing them a favor
because it makes them feel needed and wanted. It gives them a purpose.”
We continued walking around the block and then she
went her way and I went mine. I didn’t think much about it. I had given her my
number and figured I was on her call list.
The very next day I was canvassing across the
street. I parked in a driveway of a house I new to be empty and proceeded to
walk the block.
Someone drives up in a van with her in it. She
flagged me down and said she was on her way to the emergency room; she said she
had chest pains. The man driving the van was with Jehovah Witness who said “he
felt the need” to stop by her house that day. He didn’t know why he just knew
he had to drop by.
He walked in the door and took one look at her and
asked what’s wrong. He had taken her to a walk in clinic and the people there
said to take her to the emergency room. He said he had other engagements and
couldn’t stay with her, could I.
I said I would finish this block and meet them in
the ER.
When I arrived she was sitting there alone, feeling
anxious with pains both in the chest and back. I became her hand-holder. We chatted
and I learned her family lived mostly in Minnesota. I said once she was
admitted I would call them and let them know her situation. She called a
neighbor, who was like an adopted daughter, and asked if she would come down.
The doctors came by and said her EKG and other tests
were normal and they felt it wasn’t a heart attack and that made her feel
better.
When her neighbor arrived she seemed agitated and
upset than the situation called for and I didn’t understand why. By this time
it was nearly 7 P.M. and Lois was getting hungry so I left her with her
neighbor and went out to get some food.
I found her some chicken soup and a turkey sandwich
which seemed to hit the spot. When they finally found her a bed the neighbor and
I accompanied her to her room.
Later when the medical staff came in for a test the
neighbor and I waited out in the hall. I was the first time we were together
without Lois.
If was then that the neighbor told me Lois’s adult
son passed away in Minnesota that afternoon. It was out of the blue. He had had
a ski mobile accident months before and had been in rehab and seemed to be
healing. Apparently a blood clot broke loose from somewhere and lodged in his
heart.
For some reason God wanted her to be in the hospital
before they told her. She wasn’t told that night, they were waiting until the
next day when all the tests would be back.
When I got home that night my sister had sent me a
card with a picture of a steaming cup of coffee.
It read: “Good morning this is God. I will be
handling all your problems today; I will
not need your help…so have a good day. Love God.”
I took her this card and some flowers the next
morning. She hadn’t been told yet. Later on, when all her tests came back ok,
they told her.
I believe God wanted her to be somewhere safe before
she received the news.
Jenelle Pullin
Venice
