(This writing fits chronologically between persevere and chosen)
I had to accomplish three things before Susan and I could get on the plane for Barcelona on Tuesday, July 5. First, Susan had to give me a shot to raise my white blood cells. As always, she gave it in the stomach. I then had to get a COVID test which Spain required. Thankfully, I passed. Finally, we drove to Emory where Susan dropped me off to receive two units of platelets. Our dear friend Mark planned to pick Susan and our bags up at the house about four hours later, and then they would pick me up on the way to the airport.
Before my infusion, I noticed the tiny entry point of the needle in my stomach was bleeding. I knew my platelets were low as was confirmed at the hospital; then a chief nurse confirmed what I thought, “You’ll stop bleeding as soon as you get platelets in your body.” But even after we arrived at the airport, my stomach was still bleeding. I had never had this happen with a little shot.
It is true: over the last 21 years, God has been so kind to me whenever I leave the country. I was really not too worried. I figured everything would clear up as we left the ground, or as we left US territory, or at least when we landed in Spain. I was wrong; I bled the entire ten hour flight. As we met Dave and Cindy in the Barcelona Airport, I said to our missionary friends, “Guys, I think we’ll just need to meet you at the camp. I’ve got to solve a bleeding problem.” A helpful airport worker told us the nearest hospital; we gave our one suitcase to Cindy, and we caught a taxi to the ER.
We both had peace, though we had no clue what we were doing. Susan found a way to check me in at the ER, which felt a lot like Grady Hospital in Atlanta. Young doctors-in-training examined me and asked what happened. I told them that my wife had given me a shot and one exclaimed, “Your wife shot you?!” With a bit of charades to overcome the language barrier, we finally got on the same page. They took blood to measure my counts, then the lead person sprinkled some silver nitrate on the wound. Within seconds the bleeding stopped and we celebrated. It took a couple of more hours to find out my blood counts were good and finally another doctor examined me and said I was released.
Now the challenge was finding the camp. Susan and I had done it back in 2018, but I do not trust myself… I am terrible with directions. We took a taxi to the train station and bought tickets to Girona, which was the closest large town to the camp. We followed the kind worker’s directions to the correct platform to catch the train. We were standing with about 200 travelers on one side of the platform when an announcement was made. All of a sudden the crowd started rushing to the other side of the platform. I tried asking several people what was going on, but “No hablo Inglés…” was all I understood. We joined the crowd, got on the arriving train, and found a seat.
“Ay yai yai!” I’ve been lost on a train in Europe before. I always thought the camp was two hours south of Barcelona. After ten minutes, I was convinced we were going north. “Susan, I think we’re going north! We’re going to end up traveling over the Pyrenees Mountains into France!” She said, “Girona is on the way to France. We are supposed to go north.” “What?” I thought, then got up and found someone with a kind face. “Habla Inglés?” “Sí,” she answered. I asked if our train was going to stop in Girona and she said it was. Relief beyond relief! I had been wrong about directions again! I would much rather be bleeding in an emergency room than be traveling the wrong way on a train headed for another country!
In Girona, we met up with Dave, Cindy, and a dozen other Americans they had picked up at the airport. We rode their bus thirty minutes to the camp. Hallelujah! We were in Spain; my bleeding had stopped; we reunited with friends from the past and met others. After a 9:30 dinner, we were ready for bed. As we settled into our cabin for the night, my nose started bleeding. “Ay, yai, yai!”
“So do not fear, for I am with you; do not be dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you and help you. I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.” Isaiah 41:10