I Can't Believe I Took the GRE

I went to bed last night with 3 liters of D5NS going until 0500; but each drop of the iv went in to me as if my body had been lying in the desert for a month. Swoosh! Scoop! Slurp! Noises of my stomach and intestines kept awakening me at odd intervals. As if there was both a hunger and a thirst for fluids that my body could not contain.

After the iv was discontinued, I stumbled into the Master bathroom to view my face in the mirror. Now, I am not one to look at myself in the mirror. Some people, on one side of the spectum, seek out not only mirrors, but reflections of themselves in windows, pieces of plastic, or anything resembling a mirror. They check their hair, their makeup, their expressions....and look at themselves with a sparkle in their eyes. As if they were their own movie star. If only for a moment, and if only from within. It seems to bring them great joy.

At the other end of the spectrum, there are people like myself. I really acknowledge that my body is housed around my eternal soul. Whatever I look like, it is only because I was born that way. The way that I look is not important, as far as making me who I am. It is the internal that seems to be my focus. But simultaneously, my Cosmetology school reflects that great part of me that likes to do my nails, fix my hair, etc. But I just look at it once and go on with my day. I do not let 'what my face's features are' influence my outward behavior. Somewhere inside of me, I know that people sometimes think I am pretty. So, I smile a lot and try to see joy and uplifting acknowledgement in other people's eyes, not my own.

So here we are, looking for a place to park. We encircle the building, almost getting back on the freeway at one point. Finding the parking structure that services two buildings with different addresses, I think to myself: gee, if a potential medical student (here for the MCAT, medical college administration testing), law student (here for the LSAT, the law school equivalent), or graduate student could find the right place to park, he/she should get extra points. Maybe the people who can not find the parking spot end up being late...and later....and later......and just besides themselves by the time they arrive at the Testing Center.

We strolled in on time, filled out forms and promises not to cheat. We had our coats and purses garnished into a personal locker, and all watches had to go off. Feeling more like a prisoner than a test-taker, I wobbled my way to the desk with the least sunlight. By request, I figured that it would be silly to walk out of the facility from poofed lips and airway distress due to sun poisoning. Ha. I sit at my seat, put in my earplugs, and begin the tutorial on how the test is structured, etc. In the end, I think that took longer than actually taking the GRE exam itself, because I was meticulous about engraving in my brain several important items. These included the question formats, the answer formats, the use of charts, etc., such that I wished I could skip over these tedious instructions and just go straight to take the exam....but no, I just decided to take it a few days ago.

Going in for neck surgery a week from Monday, on March 22. A lucky number in my life. I feel fine about it. Am hoping it will cure my ails.......and I am interested to see what is left of me and the dysautonomia symptoms afterwards. Will I still get migraines? Will I be able to stand up? How about ... walking more than half a block? Will I still be so out of breath? And does this mean that one day I can hit the swimming pool and swim like a dolphin, the way I love so much? Alas, reality hits me in the face again and I learn and listen...to the Holy Spirit who guides me every day. For now, the only thing that is important is 1) no accidents or injuries before the 22nd, and 2) I'll be glad when I wake up from the anesthesia.

When I can open my eyes and have the realization of what happened; that I was in surgery and uh...uh..."your surgery is over". That state of consciousness. That split second between unconsciousness and reanimation. I want to be reanimated.

So I looked up my scores, to get an idea of what a 450 means. If I were applying to Stanford for a Ph.D., I would need 600+ scores on the Verbal and on the Quantitative exams. Since I'm applying for a Master's degree, 450 may be the minimum requirement to get accepted. So does that mean that I barely made it in? And 450 on both scores?

Considering that I did not study, have spinal stenosis and am in pain requiring surgery in 10 days.....and I only had 4 or 5 days between sign-up time and Exam time....perhaps this is something of an accomplishment. Or perhaps I barely squeezed by and it is not fair that this could be so. Perhaps there is some mistake, and I should have failed the Exam just because I did not study for it. I think of the undergraduate students, studying and taking exam classes for months at a time....and wala! God blessed me as all your prayers paved the road ahead.

I know there were literally hundreds of people praying for me during the actual time I took the GRE. You should know that it was as if God made the questions just for me, as all my years of experience were concisely laid out in Exam format. Thank you so much for your thoughts and your prayers. I am sure that were it not for these prayers, my Path would not have been laid out before me.

God is showing us how He opens the doors and shuts them for us. Lately, we have noticed that we walk in to an establishment like a coffee shop or the post office. No one is there, so we walk straight to get the help we need. Five minutes later, we take a peek at the line of people behind us....and there is one long line. We cheerfully walk away, saying, "Gee. If we had been here 5 minutes later, we would be at the end of that line." So we guide our eyes up to the heavens, and thank God for opening the waters before us, and closing them so tightly thereafterwards. Over and over again, this phenomenon has occurred this week. Perhaps God is trying to tell us that it is He who defies all odds, who makes things happen, and who brings us to the table, in His own time and in His own way.

The front door waterfall bellows across the living room....peace and harmony. Living life one moment at a time. We don't make things 'happen' by our own effort or will. It is God who guides us, opens the doors before us, and the power of prayer behind us is a force, a shield and a sword, that allow us to forge forward in to the forest of life, knowing that it is God that is holding us in His Hands....and using us for His perfect purposes. It is God.