When the call is from Virginia, I pay attention

I was on the landline phone with my mom yesterday afternoon when my cell phone rang.  It was a Virginia number.  I quickly hung up with her and answered my cell phone.

It was a lady--I don't remember her name--but she was with Braeden.

First, she assured me he was OK.

Then she told me he'd been in a bicycle accident.

She had taken him to a doctor's office and he wanted her to call because he didn't know his social security number.

My mind reeled with a thousand unasked questions and I propelled myself to the file cabinet where the social security numbers are filed.

"So he's OK?" I asked.

"Yes," she said, "He scraped up his arms and hands but he's OK."

"How's his bike?" I was trying to get a sense of the scope of the accident.

"His bike is fine."

But how is he?!?

I said, "So he's seen a doctor?"

"No," she said, "We are waiting.  He thought he needed his social security number for the forms he needs to fill out."


I said, "Will you tell him he doesn't need to write it down?  I will give it to you but he can just say no to writing it down."

She said, "OK."

I read off the numbers to her.

"So he's OK?" I asked again.  (Poor long suffering lady.)

"Yes."

Then I heard him talking in the background which just. About. Killed. Me.  Every cell in my body wanted to talk to him.

"Thank you for taking care of him.  Tell him I love him and to be careful."

"He can hear you," she said.  I thanked her again and we said our good-byes.

I dialed Adam's cell phone and then I burst into tears.   It really wasn't much of an event.  He crashed his bike and got a little scraped up and is OK.  End of story.

But I can't talk to him and I don't really know any details which is hard when for the past eighteen years, my life has revolved around the details.  Adam understood.  He said all the right things to make me feel better.

Being the mother of a missionary is not for the faint of heart.

Being the wife of Adam, you can have a faint heart.  He's good at that sort of thing.