Three Saturdays ago I rode my bicycle 100 kilometers. Two Saturdays ago, again, I rode 100 kilometers. This past Saturday, I rode 100 miles, completing the Surry Century! (A "century" is a 100 mile ride.)

A year ago, I was unable to complete the Surry ride. It was one of the signs that there was something seriously wrong with me.

Indeed, these days, I am very conscious of "a year ago."

A year ago, I had been to my primary care doctor, who had ordered a chest x-ray, which had come back showing some sort of masses on my lungs. A year ago tomorrow was my first appointment with a pulmonologist, to find out what was going on. A year ago this weekend, Patty and I drove down to Seabrook Island, South Carolina for what turned out to be my last visit with my father. While I was there, I developed a fever. We got back home on Saturday, but the next morning I was too sick to do church. (Council President James Wiers well remembers getting the phone call from me at 6:30 AM, asking if he would read the sermon I had prepared.) That next week, I went in for a C-T Scan of my lungs (9/25), and then endured a broncoscopy (9/29) that led my pulmonologist to think the problem was sarcoidosis. On October 4 he started me on prednizone to fight the sarcoidosis -- which, within days, made me feel worse. (The problem, of course, would turn out to be histoplasmosis, a fungal infection that grows wildly when fed steroids.) On October 26, I was admitted into the Williamsburg hospital, and on the 27th I was on a ventilator and being transferred to Norfolk General.

I look forward to the next six weeks being lots different from those six weeks a year ago!!

I was conscious of "a year ago" on the Surry Century ride two days ago, rejoicing as I was able to pedal strongly past places in the road where I had had to stop to gasp for breath the previous year. As I've begun convening the fall book study and Affirmation of Baptism classes I've been conscious of "a year ago." Last year I was only able to convene one session of each before I became too sick to continue. (Last night, one "AOB" parent, Mary Williams said, "We're not going to do that again this fall, are we?")

Yesterday was a very long day: as usual for a Sunday morning, I woke at 5:00 AM to do final preparations for that day's worship, then, when worship was over and I had talked with the last person who wanted to talk with me (at about 1:00 PM), I wolfed down a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and left the church with my vestments to drive to Pastor Fred Guy's installation service at Trinity Lutheran Church in Newport News (about 40 minutes away). After the service, I grabbed a cup of coffee at the reception (since I had taken my medicine I couldn't eat anything!) and got back in the car to get back to the church in time to eat dinner with the College students. Then was the first "AOB" session, and I got home at about 8:30 PM. This week will be full: Pre-school chapel is beginning, sermon prep, getting ready for this coming Sunday's Affirmation of Baptism session, leading sessions of the evening and afternoon prayer studies, an interview with a candidate for the open Director of Music position, a Stephen Ministers meeting, trying to fit a few visits in, and the routine things that just pop up each week. I'm looking forward to Friday night: my son, Nathan, and I will drive up to DC to see the Phillies play, so I'll get back home sometime in the early hours of Saturday morning.

In other words, I've woken up this morning with energy, and I look forward to what's coming up this week! Sure, I'm still taking that awful medicine twice a day. And my infectious disease doctor has no idea how long he'll keep me on it. I've simply learned to live with the feeling of queasiness in my stomach that's a side effect of the medicine. But I've been given bonus time, of restored health. My thankfulness to God is very deep.