by Israel Papavies

I have always had this picture in my head that represented the hardest time in my life… when Josh had cancer. There’s a yellow hallway. There are several red doors but all of them disappear and just one is left. There is a little blonde girl sitting in front of it with her knees pulled to her chest. Her hands are clamped over her ears and she rocks back and forth humming to herself to block out the noises.

No matter how hard she tries though, she just can’t block out the screaming of her little brother on the other side of the door. He’s getting a shot. It feels like he’s getting at least one everyday. The little girls face is wrenched up and tears are falling down her face. No matter how loud she hums she still hears it… doctors are running around in their funny looking outfits, the ones she memorized, the ones she grew to hate. They aren’t really there though. She is all alone, with absolutely NO ONE. She cries and hums and rocks back and forth all by her-self. THAT is the picture I have always seen to describe those years… I was all alone on the other side of the door. No one knew, and no one cared… Josh had about a 25% chance to survive… A.K.A., he wasn’t going to.

He survived and is known as a miracle. What’s even more of a miracle is that he isn’t completely mentally retarded… in fact, he isn’t at all. I had always blamed God for making me go through all of the painful things I went through. Everything my family had to endure. I went to camp this summer and started to pray during worship. I was going to thank God for everything, pray for others, and then pray for myself. Well I got to thanking God for ALL kinds of stuff. I thanked him that I still had Joshie. Then I couldn’t stop thinking about it all. The hospital, I.C.U…Everything. Then I saw that picture again.

Then the speaker asked us to sit down. I sat on the floor by one of my friends and started writing a list of what I was thankful for. I wrote down, ‘Joshie’ again. I wrote down that I was thankful for God being there with me. I had always said, yeah God was there with me… whatever, but, I had never really believed it. The speaker then said he beat up this kid because the kid called him a mean name. The kid came to his house a couple weeks later, told him he had cancer, took off his baseball cap and showed him a bald head. The boy with cancer told him that he forgave him. Then he left.

The speaker moved a little while after that without having talked to that boy again. He came back to the town and went to go see the boy. His mom answered the door and it turns out… the boy had died. It was too late. At this point I realized about a hundred things. God was with us during that hard time, and I didn’t know it but he was. And there was NO WAY that I could have gone through all that without him. Then my picture changed, only slightly but it made a world of difference. God was sitting right there with me, his arms wrapped around me and he was crying too. He was smiling though, because he knew that it wouldn’t last forever and that Josh would be ok.

The speaker asked us to stand up and we did. Then I started bawling like a baby and then one of the councilors took me outside. I wasn’t alone, I was never, and never will be alone. God is with us through it all. I’m sure I could have just told you that very last sentence but… it wouldn’t be the same. Anyhow, I cried a lot more that night, and then I was skipping around with a bag of Cheetos and a Sprite in my hand. I was really happy after that. “The whole being alone thing” and no one understanding or caring was the worst feeling in the world. But it was a false feeling…