I still believe in miracles.

At church on Sunday morning, I think I was most thankful for being able to stay at home all day Saturday with Rolf. It just doesn't happen very often.

And I was most concerned about Mom.

She's just completed her sixth round of chemotherapy and can't hide that she feels awful anymore. Mostly, she says she has so little energy that she can hardly stay awake.

Well, the heatwave began here on Sunday - and she was scheduled to accompany the gospel quartet at the Fredericksburg Agricultural Fair. Who's dumb idea was that?! My sister, Joy, who's part of the quartet, told me:

"It was tough. There was a room that had air conditioning, so she stayed in there until the last possible second. Then I whisked her home right after. She slept going down and in the room and a little on the way home. She was feeling just awful. But she didn't want to give it up . . . We went to Carl's for ice cream on the way home. That was good."

Well, I got down there on Tuesday, and said I thought she looked like she was feeling better; but she said she wasn't. Still, we had a good visit and dinner.

She made a squash casserole, which was good even though as a proud food snob the idea of squash casserole made with cream of chicken soup, saltine crackers, and cheese makes me shudder. But, yes, I had seconds! What can I say? I grew up on that stuff. I cooked the steaks, searing them, then finishing them off in a onion sauce on the stove. It was very good, even though I had to use this old granulated beef bullion, so to my tastes, it hinted of manufacture.

I scrubbed the kitchen clean and did all the dishes. When I was breaking a sweat scrubbing the backsplash, Mom laughed and said "It's good to have you around." And I said,

"Yeah, well I was thinking that maybe I could come down and make dinner for you and Dad once a week. It's not much, but if I make dinner, and clean up afterward, that's three hours that you can use to do something else that's been hard to get to."

My goal is still to see them twice a week, with Tuesdays or Wednesday's being the day I go cook and clean for them. As my Dad continues to lose his mobility, he grabs hold of walls, doors, and handles for support, and they are all filthy. I can only imagine that he spends time outside working without gloves on, and then doesn't wash his hands, and then stumbles into the wall, or grabs on a door jamb for support. I just want to remove any bad sight so they don't say to themselves: "Then there's that."

Mom's working her butt off, trying to stay active and alive, but they need help. Mom has a quilt that she was rescuing - I'm not kidding. Shannon, my niece, had washed it and it was never right again. Instead of tossing it, Mom's remaking it. Shannon said she didn't want it back, so Mom's going to rebuild it and use it down at the lake house, where everything find's a new home.

Well, Mom asked for my help with it; just to pin the batting in place. After dinner, and a game of scrabble with Shannon (who is not fun at Scrabble); we went to work on the quilt, which was upstairs. Well, Momma walked up two stairs, and just stopped. The shock that it took that much effort disgusted her. Slowly, she helped herself up by pulling on the handrails.

It's a queen sized quilt. It's going to take a lot of work to hand quilt the whole thing. But later, after we'd gotten it all pinned in place, and sat talking in the kitchen downstairs, I said:

"Well, I don't think I should stay any longer because you'll probably get some rest if I go."

"I think I'll go and get my quilting hoop and get started . . . " she said, just looking so very sad. We shared an intense look of pain or concern, to which she replied:

"When I get busy doing something like that, I forget how awful I really feel."

The latest MRI was taken yesterday.

I need that miracle now.

We believe in miracles.

I need one now.

please.