Hope

I don’t know if you ever colour in pages with pictures and words and things and some of them even tell you the colour to use.  I was doing one today and there was only one word on the page - HOPE. I wondered what colour they would suggest for the word hope and if I would actually FIND it hopeful.

As I started to colour in I was thinking about the colour psychology and how a colour can be applied to a person.  And I thought of other colours too…and that then started me thinking about rainbows, and the different colours I have for my children in heaven and Johnathan too.  They all have their own colour.  But let’s return to hope….I was going off on a tangent there.

I believe hope to be a really powerful word.  And a positive one too.  When you receive what you hope for, it’s a blessing.  I hoped for our new bed - LONGED for it in fact.  I have been napping on my recliner chair for a LONG time.  And my sleep was rarely deep or restorative.  We worked towards getting it and hoped we could get there and this year we DID!  Hoping and working to get something makes whatever it is much more meaningful.  I don’t always go to sleep the moment I get in bed, or I sometimes wake up early but OH MY GOODNESS!  That bed is SO comfortable.

All my life I have wanted a dog of my own.  And yes, we had a dog called Sandy as a child, that was called mine and I believed it was so that I would feed her and let her in and out during the day.  I never really truly felt she was mine.  I always lived in hope that I would end up having one of my own and told Kevin about it, of course.  His response was that when we had a door we could open and let the dog straight out into the garden when it needed, we could get a dog.

Well, when we came to this disabled adapted place 8 years ago, there is the door that we can use to let the dog in and out of the garden - and it is fenced all around, too.  So one of the first things we did was to get a dog.  And she is my Maisie.  She is a friendly, outgoing dog and mostly loves being on my lap or curled up next to me in my comfy chair.  The only time I don’t really get much time with her is when Kevin’s parents come.  The moment she sees Frank, she is desperate to get to him and sit on his lap!

In spite of everything, I didn’t give up hope.  I knew we would manage both things eventually.  When a hope has to be put off again and again, yes, it gets extremely frustrating.  But that doesn’t mean you have to give up hope. 

And you know?  I was confused as to whether I would ever marry or not.  There were many times I considered going into a convent, but I never could get the courage up to even enquire about it.  But I also wanted someone I could talk to, who would listen to me and be there for me and I would be there for them, and every other blessing marriage holds.  I knew somehow (inside me) that if I ever married it would be to a disabled person.  And I have no idea how I knew it. 

Hope can remain with you, even when everything else has left.  It can encourage you to believe in your dreams and follow them.  It can bring you to the heights of ecstasy and to the depths of despair.  So you have to choose which one you will follow.  Work towards getting what you want with the abilities you have, but also hope for them.  It makes the getting all the more sweeter.

Hope is a solid word and one that is good to use in a positive way.  Try your hardest to keep it that.  You won’t always succeed, but that’s ok.  There’s always tomorrow.

Love and blessings