Sunlight

Mom’s eyesight was deteriorating from macular degeneration, but I didn’t know how bad it had gotten until one morning I watched her stoop to pick up something off the floor. She grabbed at it, then studied her empty thumb and forefinger with a puzzled expression. Frowning, she turned to me. Behind the thick lenses of her glasses, her blue-green eyes clouded with concern.

“Mom,” I said, “it’s just a patch of sunlight.”

Over the past several years we had equipped Mom’s in-law apartment with special low-vision aids such as extra halogen lighting, a high-tech magnifying monitor for reading, and big-print phones. Thank the Lord, she could still drive.

And then came the words I think we both had been silently dreading: “I—I don’t think I should be driving anymore,” she said. Boom. Just like that, our worlds collapsed.

“It’s okay, Mom,” I said. “Don’t worry. We’ll work it out.”

But I was worried. If Mom no longer drives, who’s going to take her to the grocery store? To doctors’ appointments? To Bible study? To visit her friends? My life was busier than ever with two active teenagers, work, and managing my own household. How was I ever going to meet my mother’s needs? My eyes fell on that glimmering patch of sunlight on the floor, a reminder of God’s infinite capacity in the most worrisome times. Yes, we would
work it out, with God’s help.