Laying here at Mayo on day seven of my epilepsy monitoring unit experience, waiting for seizures and wondering when I will get that heartbreaking message to let me know that my dad’s journey has taken him to the spirit world. I find myself thinking about the history that cradles me in its arms and provides me strength.

Our strength is not solely our own. It comes from the generations before us who have brought us to this place. These days I find myself thinking of many people, one is my great-aunt Sr. Christine.

Sr. Christine was born in 1898 in Wisconsin. She grew up on a farm in outside of Port Washington. Many Catholic families of that time were pleased to have children grow up to be nuns and priests. I don’t know if my great-grandparents wanted Sr. Christine to become a nun, but I do remember hearing that they were unhappy with her choice to join the School Sisters of Notre Dame. They had apparently wanted her to be a Franciscan. But, Sr. Christine was a determined young woman who’d heard her calling and followed it despite the unrest that it caused in her family.

My memories of her are of visits to the convent where she lived in her latter years. I think of that little blue room that she lived in. She had her bed, a small wardrobe, and her chair. I don’t remember any other furniture. I don’t remember if there were more chairs for guests. I suppose there were or maybe we brought them in from another room. Her life was simple. Yet every time we visited she had a smile on her face and was delighted to share in conversations with many questions about how all the family was doing. I remember too how every time we went to visit she would have me or maybe mom or dad go to her wardrobe to pull out a little gift for me, usually a prayer card though once she gave me a lovely heart shaped box that I kept for years.

I think of her now as I lay here in this hospital bed and I recognize who taught me and where my strength comes from. It is from Sr. Christine who lived a life of simplicity and faced many challenges with a joyous determination and simple understanding that things would be okay. It is also from many others in my ancestry who I love and revere, but those stories are for another time. For now, I simply thank that dear woman for teaching me and making me who I am. I hope that my actions in life can honor her.