The power of the small...

I do sickness gracefully - it is an art I learned during my near three years of chemotherapy and radiation. Aches, pains, viruses…breaking body parts, shots into the bone, muscles, spinal chord, veins….surgeries, procedures, sprains, pulled and torn ligaments and tendons…all of that with (mostly) the grace of Mother Theresa. However, I have a proverbial Achilles heel - my cryptonite - throwing up. Yep. Give me a stomach bug or food poisoning, a batch of gag-inducing medications, and I am a complete mess. Perhaps it stems from the reaction to various chemotherapies, a long term psychological effect from nausea, shaking, and holding onto to the coolness of the porcelain throne (um, toilet). Regardless - I am the opposite of grace when it comes to nausea and vomiting!

With all the stomach bugs making their rounds through the population (Purple a victim of such), I was thinking. Drives to doctor's offices without kids arguing or giggling in the back seat allow for such times of contemplation! These "bugs" are microscopic, unseen by the human eye, yet they wreak havoc on our health! Viruses and bacteria - teeny, tiny things that can take the grown man from health to the hospital in a matter of days. In doing General Science with my older two kids, we are learning about the five kingdoms: Monera, Protista, Fungi, Plantae, and Animalia. Bacteria belongs to the Monera kingdom - a prokaryotic cell (no distant membrane-bounded organelle) - so small, so powerful. (Viruses, oddly, don't fall into any of those kingdoms!)

To be even more contemplative - there is power in the small, the unseen. Adolf Hitler was an art reject, barely surviving in Vienna - yet he rose to lead a conquering nation and was responsible for World War II and the killing of millions. Jesus Christ was the son of poor carpenter and teenage mother, yet birthed the now world-wide faith of Christianity! A small size or lack of importance doesn't mean lack of power. Like the bacteria or virus that spreads through families, a single person can influence the world. Ok, maybe not exactly alike, but you get the idea, right?

(PS - a quick hello to my German and Russian readers - thank you for consistently stopping by for a view!)