I'll bet I'm not the only one who remembers hotel wake-up calls, eh? Before the days of pagers or cell phones or complimentary alarm clocks in the rooms, there was the time-honored tradition of the wake-up call from the person working at the front desk. Yes, person at the desk ... not an automated, robotic voice or loud computer-generated tone in your ear but an unusually cheerful human voice saying, "Good morning! This is your requested wake-up call. It's 6:30 ... time to rise and shine!" OK ... maybe the person wasn't quite that chipper and friendly, but it was a real person on the phone calling to tell me it was time to get up. And to this day, every time I stay in a hotel I remember those personalized greetings that roused me from sleep and began my day. I know that technology is a great tool, and trust me, I rely heavily on it myself ... but sometimes I miss the personal touch, you know? Like a human voice on the phone in a hotel saying, "Good morning! It's time to get up!"
Sometimes I wonder if God gets as tired and frustrated with me as I do ... if sometimes He would like to just slap me or shake me and scream, "When will you ever learn, child???" I think perhaps He must have been thinking that today for sure because obviously He wants me to learn a lesson ... a lesson I haven't quite figured out yet, but I do know that it's got something to do with alarms. How do I know that, you ask? Because this morning, my alarm didn't go off like it was supposed to ... my alarm on the clock radio that has rested by my bed for more than 20 years didn't beep. It didn't beep because it's broken ... well, the alarm part is broken, the radio works just fine. There's nothing like waking up an hour late to get my day off to a lovely start, and I've thought about my clock radio all day long. About how many years we've spent together ... how reliable it has been ... how much I've trusted it ... how it had never failed me until today.
I bought a new watch a while back ... a watch with three alarms on it that would beep to remind me to take my meds at certain times throughout the day. All it took was a week or so of either taking the wrong medication at the wrong time or forgetting to take it altogether to make me acknowledge that I needed some sort of alarm system. I tried using the alarm on my phone, but I have to keep my phone on vibrate when I'm at work and I don't always have my phone with me. Hence the idea of a watch with a multiple alarm system ... and it has worked like a charm, with the only drawback being that the beep is sort of loud and I'm sure my co-workers tire of hearing it every day. Having the alarms on my watch has been great until today when they didn't beep. The alarms didn't beep because they're broken ... and before you ask, of course I went to the store to see if my $25 Timex multiple-alarm watch needed a battery. It wasn't the battery ... my watch is broken. I'm not exactly sure how late I was with my medication today or if I even took it all like I'm supposed to, and I realized as I drove to Target this evening to buy a new watch how much I've come to rely on the alarms on my watch ... how much I trust them ... how they had not failed me until today.
The bad news is that I couldn't find an alarm clock for my dresser that was to my liking, so I'll have to count on my phone to wake me tomorrow morning. The good news is that I did, however, find a watch ... a watch with six alarms rather than three. It's bigger and heavier than my old watch so it will take a little time (pun intended) for me to get used to it. As I walked with Ollie on our trail this evening, I couldn't help but notice the extra weight on my left wrist. And when we came to the wooden bridge and Ollie did his little barking running game across the slatted structure, I started thinking about old things breaking and new things replacing them. "Is that the lesson?" I questioned aloud as my hound and I neared the end of the bridge. "Am I supposed to learn something about broken things being made new, God? Am I supposed to learn a lesson about reliability? Or trust? Or change? Or alarms? Or reminders? Or wake-up calls? Or what, God??? What's the lesson? What's the message? I know You have one ... You always do, but this time I really, really, really don't get it."
So here's the thing ... I think maybe you guys should write in and tell me what you think the lesson might be. Maybe it's not a lesson for me after all ... maybe it's one for you. Or both of us. Or maybe it's just some broken alarms and nothing more ... yeah, right.
1 comment:
Did you wake up with a song in your head or panic in your heart. God talks to me through random lyrics replaying over and over. My guess, your gut is reliable, more reliable than a watch. While they are useful, you knew something was wrong and took action to take care of yourself. That's a huge lesson.
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