One Great Week

It's been an amazing first week of blogging. The first post of God-of-Small-Thing was picked up by TheRevealer.org and by the end of the week, this brand new blog was mentioned in Christianity Today's Weblog.

With all the fighting in Boston and San Francisco over gay marriage, and the debates over the meaning of marriage, this story from The St. Paul Pioneer Press seemed fitting.

The headline says it all: "Illness can't stop this love. After 61 years of marriage, a husband will not let his wife's Alzheimer's disease separate them."

While there's no faith mentioned in the story, it's still there, in the care that Norman Osland shows his wife Dorothy, who was diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease in 2002. They first met when he was 17 and she was 16 and have been together since.

"The love doesn't stop, irregardless of the circumstances," Norman tells the Pioneer Press. "Love with elderly people is still hugs and kisses. It's still love."

He shows that love day by day in caring for Dorothy at home.

"He helps her bathe and dress, and he prepares her food, including her nightly ice cream treat, which she selects from among the 10 cartons in the freezer. He tucks her in at night, often two or three times, which means his own sleep is fragmented. And he gives her the kind of gifts she appreciates nowadays — the house is strewn with small stuffed animals."

In her lifetime, Dorothy gave selfllessly to care for Norman's mother and her daughter, Nancy, who was born with brain damage for 49 years. Nancy went to a nursing home nine years ago, when her parents were too old to lift her.

"Now, an agitated Dorothy searches the house, looking for her daughter."

"She did everything for everybody," Norman told the Pioneer Press.

And now he does for her. That's all any of us could hope for in a marriage.