ATHENA

Athena and I have known each other for twenty four years..... She is a wondrous creation of the Sovereign Lord. Athena is always has always and I believe will always put the considerations of others, before herself. In every way, shape and form. At one time during her earlier years, she came across a mother and her toddler daughter in our congregation who had lost their home. And needed a place to live, Indefinitely if necessary. Athena took them both to her home, gave the two her own bedroom for as long as they wanted to stay, no rent, nothing expected in return. And she stayed on the couch in her living room.

She during recent times has, as she has always during my hard times and I mean every single time, been right there by my side. I have had three major operations in the last year and a half. And she was the only one there for me. Sure I had members of my Church to help me with food when I was recuperating at home, (and here I have to give a shout to Desmond Archer) but she? She went to the hospital with me, every time. She stood by me as they prepped me pre-op and then wheeled me in to surgery, every time. She waited and waited for me to come out of surgery, every time. One operation took seven and a half hours. And at the end of it, she was right there with her love for me and arms open to comfort as she had always done, every time. She was at my home the evening of my first surgery. I had fallen over against the bed on my left side and fallen asleep, and my left leg positioning come to find out later. Had caused a bulging disc at L4-L5 to fully herniate and crush my sciatic nerve and when I woke up after hours of being this way I began to vomit and I was able to call out to Athena for help and she turned on the light and I was vomiting up blood and phlegm, tons of it. And don't you know she cleaned up everything that very moment, "are you alright", and "don't worry" was all she kept saying and calling on the name of the Lord....she even got all of the blood that had soaked into my pajamas out, by washing them in cold water, by hand, that same night.

My leg was fully paralyzed over the course of about two or three days, she became my human crutch and then she had to leave me and my mother came over for two days. During that time I couldn't get to the hospital because of the pain of the other operation and Athena, helped me with everything I could have possibly ever asked for. I eventually ended up on the operating table again to fix the paralysis and the disc, that happened six months subsequent to the accident.

There was a time this last summer when I, for some unexplained reason became fully paralyzed in my right hand, and I am right handed. I immediately called Athena and she said that she was on the way. I went to the doctor and I couldn't fill out the form they gave me, you know on that clipboard thing and the receptionist was so nice she filled it out for me. All I had to do is sign it. I thought that was really nice, but necessary considering my current situation. I went right in to see the doctor and I had been terrified. Praying from the moment I woke up and had thought I slept on my arm the wrong way. The doctor examined me and sent me to the hospital where I had my cervical spinal surgery, to see my neurosurgeon. He thought that the problem was stemming from a complication from that operation. The butterflies in my stomach flew into a frenzy.....Athena met me at the hospital and comforted me in her usual and much welcomed fashion. And I went in for a cervical MRI that was inconclusive. Athena whisked away each worry with a joke, each wrinkle in my forehead with a gentle touch, each word of doubt with words or encouragement and deep wisdom of a wise and devoted woman, to have faith in the Lord, to trust him. That I had been through far worse in my life and that everything would be just fine. And she was right. Over the next two weeks, my hand was back to normal and it was as if it hadn't happened at all. Athena...so wise, so practical, so spontanious, so full of joy and love.

I had an emergency situation arise when I was staying at one of the men from my church's living room. I just got my disability award and I was outtta there!!!! Don't you know that Athena found me my current place to live. It's perfect, it's three blocks from an awesome train, the neighborhood is beautiful, I have about eight to ten busses to take me wherever I want to go, the people are cordial, even the babies wave hello!!!. The shop owners are glad to have you, and I've become friends with quite a few in only a matter of months. There are TONS of mom and pop stores of all types and varieties, it's quiet after an early hour, my neighbors are cool, and much much more all because of Athena.

She has been my ear to listen to me, Athena has been my hug when I have needed that warm and loving embrace from that more than special someone who just KNOWS me. Knows me inside and out. More than anyone else, on this planet, even my own mother. Speaking of mothers. When I was recently faced with homelessness, I was preparing to enter a men's homeless shelter. I was trying everything. Her mother upon hearing this told Athena that there was no way she would let that happen and if I could not find a place to live. I was more than welcome under their roof to live, as family. My own mother, after I told her about what was going on in my life at the moment and that I was losing my apartment and needed somewhere to go after my surgeries had left me broke and I still needed recovery time and this that and the other thing, said, no, I couldn't live with her. I was devastated. Athena was there. But I found a basement room to stay in, at the home of one of the men in my church. She is a wonderful and caring mother to a beautiful little girl and they adore each other. They play and do all little girl and mommy stuff. I usually stay out of that cause I'm a dude and when I spend time with Athena's daughter we kind of do girly stuff, but I'm a dude, so it's girly-dude stuff. Athena has a wonderful and creative artistic side with fire and passion right there with it. Just give her some wire and her ball peen hammer and leave the room! She makes beautiful jewelry and has just begun her jewelry making career. Already she's making a name for herself and I am so proud of her! I am a blessed man to have her in my life, at times she is the only thing that will do. Just give me Athena, and that's the end of it.

As a man, in love, I am mesmerized and astonished by her constant and consistent radiance of internal as well as external beauty.

Not a man who has ever, or that will ever walk this earth will take her love from me, for I am her heart she has told me this many a time, and I know this to be true with all certainty...It is a love, our love, that is beyond the conventional but soars high into the etheral planes of the spiritual and beyond. To gaze into her dark lipid pools is an experience that I am blessed to have. Athena is love encapsulated into the form of a woman and I see her as a blessing, a gift to me from the Sovereign Lord.