Palm Tree

Thursday presented me with another surgery. Thank you to the great staff at Maine Medical Center who took great care of me and allowed my son to watch the procedure. This makes procedure number 43 or 44, but who’s counting.?  And yes, I was back in the gym two days later.??

Someone asked me; “Does it get old?” Of course, but the reward is worth it. They do it for the benefit of me and what is a little pain/discomfort in exchange for a better quality of life?
I look at my situation as that of a “Palm Tree”.
People see a palm tree and don’t truly understand it’s strength. If you notice during a hurricane, trees become uprooted, but a palm tree hardly ever is. It will bend completely over until the branches touch the ground. And after the storm it stands upright as if nothing ever happened. One thing unique about the palm tree is it get its strength through the storm. When a storm comes it roots grow stronger, deeper to protect the tree. Anyone who has ever tried to dig up a palm can tell you it has fibrous roots that not only fan out to great distances, but also go down deep. Like to somewhere down around the tectonic plates. So all this combines to give a palm tree a very solid base in the ground and a very supple trunk that will bend in the wind without breaking. If it was not for the storm the root system would never reach it’s full potential.
So it is in life. We must go through the storm for it will enable us to endure life’s “little problems” with ease.
I now understand the hymns they would sing in church when I was young.