Wake-up call

Just about every Saturday morning I work an extra shift on my job. The pay is pretty good, but the work is even more of a weekend eye-opener.

During the week, the intake calls I take on my job as a call-center phone counselor are primarily of the less-intensive level, although there are occasionally some crisis calls. But mostly it's issues with marriage problems, parenting problems, problems at work, people with addictions, depression, anxiety, stress. Sometimes somebody is having suicidal thoughts or there is some domestic violence. But the majority of calls are fairly routine.

But on the weekend I help take calls for the after-hours room, where all sorts of problems come in, including a lot of calls from hospitals that are asking for authorization for treatment for people who are in life-threatening situations, or employers are calling for assistance when an employee has died. That sort of thing. And I do this for 4 hours on a Saturday, and I realize there are people who do this 5 days a week, or who work in emergency rooms and see this stuff all the time. So I don't feel like I'm any sort of unique person for being exposed to this.

But it's a weekly wakeup call for me. It is a reminder of how fortunate/blessed I am that for the vast majority of my life, I am not facing any of these traumatic issues on a personal basis. That life is manageable.

Now the theologian in me is rearing his head and saying, "Hold on. You're going to die some day. Manage that, will you?" And that theologian is right. Death is a problem. But Jesus Christ is managing that one for me. I'm OK.