Having spent the last two days being horizontal, I have a renewed appreciation for those paired words often included in a wedding ceremony.

"In sickness."

It was neither a life threatening nor a protracted illness, like that of the woman I brought dinner to last week. But it was enough to render me vulnerable and weepy. Each time John took my temperature, or made a decision about where to go for help I fell farther in his debt. 

Marriage and parenting are systems that web us together as we take turns falling to pieces. I was not much of a wife or mother over the weekend and it afforded the people I love a chance to cover for me. I am humbled. 

Jesus invited us to visit the sick. There is no stipulation that we cure them, which is a relief since my healing powers are slim. In the hours when I lay alone I thought of people in my life that I could have done more for. My mother had breast cancer, and hid it from me. If I could change one thing it would have been to spend more time with her, that she might have a distraction from the incessant fear of what was taking over her chest.

I could have visited my father more in the years when emphysema robbed him of breath. But I had five children to fill my days and kept him on hold. I regret that. It hurts that he died alone. 

Being a partner to someone who is sick is not usually in the top ten bucket items of getting hitched. But then again it is nothing short of holy ground.