This morning I received a text from a friend and former Sunset Zoo colleague, Anna Quaintance. Yep, that’s her name (if you don’t get it, say the full name out loud). Anna moved to Connecticut a few years back with her Dena – leaving behind a brother and a wide community of friends. Anyhoo, she had flown into Atlanta to meet up with her brother and then head to the Shepherd Center, a spinal cord & brain injury rehabilitation non-profit. Their cousin is at the center recovering his strength after an attempted kidnapping and shot to the spine while working in a volatile Latin American country. With Anna…and because of the intimate nature of the Shepherd Center’s work, I did not know what to expect. I shouldn’t have worried.
Between Anna’s “WHASSUP?!” when I finally rounded the corner to the very last hug at the hotel, the visit was a gift…not to them-but to me.
Her boisterous welcome seemed a little “merry” for what I expected to be a somber place – a hospital/therapy facility devoted to people with injuries that most of us wince just hearing about. Her goofiness and irrepressible optimism, though, was right at home.
After stepping into the first therapy ward, I noticed that a very present peace pervaded each floor, room, and conversation we encountered. The Shepherd Center’s greatest asset was a palpable peace.
There was an easy rhythm to the places and staff we encountered. Staff moved in an unorchestrated grace as they encouraged, challenged, buckled, stretched, listened to, and engaged both the clients and colleagues. Several times I watched as team members working with separate clients, switched roles so that the big buff guy(s) could best help someone stand in their harness and the colleague could calibrate a machine or reach into their specialties. They didn’t talk much about this tag-team approach; the staff just seemed to be aware of one another, aware of the needs, and absent of ego. They had found their professional efficiencies and bathed them in compassion. And their work has placed them in the top 10 rehabilitation units in the United States.
Not all of the clients or families’ faces were full of hope, but I saw no despair and heard no forced chirpiness. I have never witnessed such professionalism, such peace, such profound care in a hospital-type setting-or any setting that comes readily to mind-until today. And it challenges me. I am challenged to occupy the space that I am in with compassion, peace, grace, and selflessness.
And because of Anna, her brother, Scott, and their cousins, I am challenged to keep it fun. You see, Anna and Scott are facing a genetic “lottery” that requires annual visits to specialists and researchers with big needle-y tests. Not fun stuff. But in the dynamic duo, is the stuff of life and joy. We may never agree about matters of faith, but we will always agree that life is worth the living and it’s “about damn time we start living it.”
So to Anna & Scott, their cousin, Tony, and the family they’ve accumulated over years of living, I raise my fizzy pop with a sincere thanks and a hearty, “WHASSUP!?”
