Thank God for God

By Bud Focht

Hi, my name is Bud and I truly believe that the only reason I am still living the great life I am living is because of Devine Intervention.

Let me clarify “the great life” I am living and “Devine Intervention.”

When I say Devine Intervention I’m not talking major miracles here.

Major miracles are like Lazarus of Bethany coming back to life. Water changing to wine at that wedding in Cana. The 1980 United States ice hockey team made up of college kids beating the professional, steroid-enhanced Russian team in the medal round on its way to the Olympic gold medal.

Those are major miracles, of Biblical proportion.

No, I’m not talking about that drastic of interventions. I’m talking about some of the less-noticed ones. But I noticed. And I am thankful.

My senior year in college I was somehow able to secure one of the top graduate assistantships in my field, in the athletics department at a university in New Orleans. I was set to begin my career in NOLA, one of the most unique cities in the United States, famous for its cuisine, music, and of course Mardi Gras. A 21-year-old partying, student-athlete’s dream come true.

Until the director of athletics at my own college in Miami, having known me from the baseball team, offered me the same deal, only at my alma mater. I had a choice to make. Go to a large university in the Big Easy and learn my craft, my chosen profession, and be all by myself in an exciting new town, or stay in my comfort zone and return to my many friends, girls and guys (especially girls), in fun-in-the-sun Miami to begin my professional career.

I unwisely turned down the New Orleans gig and chose to return to South Florida.  Unwisely because at the very last minute the funding for the job at my alma mater fell through.

Shit! Should’ve gone to New Orleans, where the person who replaced me went on to a lucrative job with the NCAA and later with the Professional Golfers’ Association (PGA).

But as my grandmother always used to say, “When God closes a door He always opens a window.”

That window was a last minute grad-assistantship at a small college in Rhode Island.

I was thinking ‘Rhode Island? Is that part of New York?’ Rhode Island is a pretty small state. In fact, the smallest. How small WAS their small college?

Well, it was big enough to have an intercollegiate tennis team among its 15 NCAA Division III varsity sports.

And the rest, as they say, is history. I spent three years in New England, fell in love, went on to get a real job in New Jersey, went back to RI to marry the star of the tennis team, and we began our life together.

I often wondered what if I had chosen that large university in New Orleans over the small college in Miami. What if the Miami job hadn’t fallen through? I would have never met my soulmate, my wife Terry.

Devine Intervention. I am sure of it.  And I am very grateful.

When I said I was grateful for living the great life I am living, by no means did I mean I am living the high life, but I am still living, still breathing. And so is my wife Terry. And we are living and breathing together.  

And by together, I mean 24-hours-a-day together.

I once wrote a feature story that ran in a national publication on a married couple that coaches together. Both teachers, the husband was the girl’s high school basketball coach and his wife was his assistant coach. And the wife was a college head field hockey coach and the husband was her assistant.  In the story, I wrote how the best thing about a married couple working together was that they were together all of the time. And the worst thing about it was the fact that they were together ALL OF THE TIME.

Once Terry entered the middle stage of Early Onset Alzheimer’s Disease and required 24/7 assistance, I was very fortunate to be able to retire (five or six years earlier than I had planned on) to take care of her. If the statistics on the Alzheimer’s web site are correct, my premature pension (better than a gold watch, much less than a nest egg) should last just about as long as my wife’s shrinking brain does.

So when I miss going out with the guys, going to the Phillies games, going to the Jersey Shore, I have to remind myself that I am going to miss Terry so much more.

When times get tough, when the frustration of her condition causes her to display uncharacteristic behavior such as anger and even violence, I have time-to-time felt sorry for myself. “Why is God doing this to Terry? Why is He doing this to me?”

I have to keep reminding myself that God doesn’t work that way. He is not doing this to us. In fact, He is helping us handle this.

We all have our own crosses to bear. We all have our own problems. There is a common belief, one that I support, that goes something like this: If you formed a circle of people, and everyone making up the circle could take their worst problem and put it in the middle, and then go around the circle and everyone had to pick one problem from that pile in the middle to have, most people, seeing what others have to deal with, would take their own problem back.

No matter how bad Terry and I have it, I know that there are people out there who have it worse. As we will in the future.

I’m reminded of that poem about the footprints in the sand. Something about walking with God on a beach during your life and seeing two sets of footprints. During the difficult times the person noticed only one set of footprints and wondered why God had left him alone. He later came to know that God did not leave him. The one set of footprints during the difficult times was God carrying him.

When I get pissed at our situation, when I get hurt (feelings, not physical bruises) because Terry lashes out at me even though I wait on her all day, feeding her, bathing her, dressing her, trying to entertain her, I have to take a step back and be thankful. Thankful for the good times we had over the last 38 years. Thankful for the good times we have now, like when Terry laughs.

I have to be thankful. Because I know the good times are getting less and less, and the tough times are getting tougher. That is what is so bad about this disease. It is only going to get worse. It IS getting worse.

More and more often these days, there is only one set of footprints in the sand.

Thank God for the good days I have with Terry. Thank God for allowing me to be with her 24/7 during the middle and last stage of this fucked up disease.

Thank God for God.

Until next time, no matter how bad things get, thank God and be grateful for what you have.

Bud