Adversity is not something that we like to go through or even think about, but it’s something I’ve been thinking about this last week. I think it goes without saying…but I’m going to say it anyway…. that adversity is relative. What seems like a true hardship to one person is actually a lifestyle improvement to someone else. Being a one car family in our culture would seem to be experiencing adversity to most observers, while it would be a blessing of enormous proportions in another culture. As I’ve been thinking through adversity and its effects, a certain person that I know who experienced adversity kept coming to mind….my Grandpa Polk.
Grandpa Polk was a lead miner in Southeast Missouri. Beyond the obvious health and environmental concerns that went along with his profession, I don’t think it paid much. Grandpa and Grandma had 6 kids and lived in a 2 Bedroom house. To help keep this in perspective, I’ve got half the kids with twice the number of bedrooms.
In the late 60’s something happened that changed Grandpa’s life forever….. something went horribly wrong at the lead mine. There was an accident and Grandpa Polk was run over by a rail car. He almost died and had to have one leg amputated at his knee and the other at his ankle. I only have two memories of my Grandpa walking and they are both just little snippets of him walking through his house. So, I didn’t know much about him prior to the accident. My personal knowledge of Grandpa Polk is after adversity hit him hard. There are several things I want to point out about his life after being hit with adversity that I think we all can learn from.
He didn’t give up. He learned how to drive a vehicle using hand controls for the gas and brake pedal. He went on many a camping trip and he would hook up the camper, drive, and set up the camper when he got to the campsite. Setting up a pop-up camper isn’t much fun, but I can’t imagine doing it from a wheelchair! I remember him building things, including a back deck and one time he tried to get out and mow his yard using a push mower….in his wheelchair! He didn’t give up.
Adversity brought out things that might have remained hidden. Grandpa wrote a LOT of poetry. I don’t know if he wrote much before the accident, but I believe that he had a lot more time to wax poetic after the accident. The accident probably gave him a perspective that he previously did not have and could have provided fodder for his work. Adversity shaped him in a way that let certain aspects of his being shine that might have otherwise remained untapped.
He laughed with what he had left. When Grandpa laughed, he shook. I remember him, time and again, sitting in his wheelchair, bouncing up and down from laughing so hard. Sure, I imagine that he had days that he felt down and wondered what-if, but I never saw it. He laughed in spite of adversity.
I don’t know what adversity you have experienced, are experiencing or will experience….but you will face adversity at some point. It may not be as traumatic as the adversity Grandpa Polk faced or it could be worse. My advice to you is to do as I have and learn from my Grandpa Polk….
Don’t give up.
Realize that adversity can bring out something beautiful and poetic in you.
Laugh with what you have left.
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