As you may have seen in my previous post, my family and I are currently going through a challenging time. Since that post, yet another event occurred, bringing more challenges, more fear, and more emotions into our lives.
What we are experiencing right now feels familiar, and it has, in many ways, reminded me of 2018 when I was newly injured, experiencing medical challenges, and needing care and support from the medical community and my personal community.
I look back on those memories of 2018 to remind myself of the ways I was supported, so that I can also provide support through acts of service – one act of service in particular…
Giving someone a ride.
“I’ll give you a ride.”
I think this offer carries a lot of weight. To me, it shows that someone cares about you.
Maybe they simply want to spend time with you, and the drive feels like a great way to do that. Maybe they are actually the ones feeling lonely or stressed, and accepting their offer of a ride is a way you can help them heal. Or maybe they want to help ease a burden, and offering to drive you wherever you need to go is a way for them to do this for you.
No matter the circumstances, though, it always seems to carry some emotion.
I have had quite the journey with this simple sentence. I have been the one people were driving to see when I was spending months in the hospital. I was the one who then had to ask for rides or wait to be offered them once I was out of that hospital and could not yet drive myself. And now, I finally get to be the one to offer this gesture in return. I get to be the one who says, “I’ll give you a ride.”
It was certainly a learning curve and a long road to get here – relearning to drive with hand controls while also taking many steps to recover physically and mentally. It was a road worth taking, and I am now capable and confident behind the wheel of my Chevy.
I’ve always felt that time spent in the car together brings a unique kind of closeness – the ability to sit in silence, or fill it with chatter, or belt out a song.
It also gives you time to reflect or catch up on aspects of life you haven’t had time to think about or bring up recently.
When those drives happen during a time that is already challenging, emotional, or fatiguing, the time spent in the car feels even more valuable.
I remember when I was going through my medical challenges, how the drive home from one of my appointments always felt like my safe haven. How getting into the car after the medical part of the day was done, and then letting someone drive me home, felt like the greatest gift.
It was when I could truly sit back and process everything that had happened that day. And when I was ready, they were right beside me to talk about it. With nothing but a long drive ahead and a companion beside me, I had all the time in the world to process, communicate, and evaluate what was going on in my life.
So, of course, after getting to feel that way myself, I now crave being able to provide that for someone else. While my family has been going through new challenges, it gives me a sense of calm, peace, and clarity to let them relax in my passenger seat as I drive us where we need to go – to be able to look at them and know that they need a break, and to offer that to them.
Because now it is their turn to unwind after a long day, to turn to the person in the car beside them, and process all that is going on.
And if I thought it was a calming feeling to sit in the passenger seat and turn my mind off after a long day, I didn’t yet know how great it would feel to do the opposite. To be able to hop into the driver’s seat and say to someone else, “I’ll give you a ride,” so that they could get their turn to relax.