Friday, July 27, 2012
June 12, 1914
The heat rose in waves from the ground. The stillness was stifling. Not even a warm breeze to blow the dusty, dry earth. For the farmer, the dust billowed around the plow, covering him from view in a cloud of parched earth.
She watched from the two-room house, squinting her eyes against the morning sun. All she could see was that distant cloud of dirt, tiny on the horizon. The time had come. Would he notice? They had an agreement: when she knew it was time, she would hang out the bed sheet from the window, he would see it from the field and go for help.
She did what she could to prepare, her body continually preparing itself. Set out the needed supplies. Pace the floor. Breathe. Pray. Surely help would come soon. Surely he would see the sign in the window beckoning him home. With sweat beads forming and trickling down her face, dampening her skin, her body racked with pain, reprieve would allow her to catch her breath for a minute or two until the next wave. Time was running short. The children (the oldest not yet three) now must be called inside and the door latched. She couldn't risk them being out of her watchful eye. Oh, where was the doctor? She lingered like this until her body and the child within could wait no longer. Alone with her two children, she languished to give life to another.
As daylight faded, she gazed at the peaceful face of her newborn daughter, thankful for what blessings she had received. With the coming twilight, cooling the air of the scorching day, the work day ended for the farmer and he turned toward home only then to realize "the sign" now gently blowing in the slight evening breeze. Fearful for what he might find inside those four walls, his pace quickened. The sounds of his young children greeted him as he approached. He entered the house out of breath to see not two children, but now three--the youngest just hours old in the arms of his healthy wife, weary yet happy.
Help had arrived for the young mother that day. Not in the form of another person, the doctor or her mother, but help from On High, giving her courage and strength from within. Strength she would need her entire life; for events, both tragic and joyous, that would shape the direction of an entire family for generations to come. Strength to face what each day brought. This day it was a glorious new life, her precious baby girl, Viola.
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