March 24, 2025 
by M. Regina Cram
I stepped into the building, nervously glancing at the crowd gathered for our high school reunion. None of my close friends were attending, but I knew most of my classmates, so I decided to go alone.
Several friendly men greeted me. I glanced at their name tags and graduation photos but didn’t recognize them.
I wandered through the crowd. Names and faces seemed strange. I’m pretty good with names, so it was surprising.
I continued to circulate. Each time I thought I saw a familiar face, the name tag said otherwise. Gradually, I realized the stark truth: I didn’t know a soul. I was standing in a crowd of 150 strangers.
Years ago, I suffered a brain injury that robbed me of oxygen and wiped out a great deal of long-term memory. Most of my childhood is missing. I don’t remember my wedding or my kids’ first steps. It’s like looking at a jigsaw puzzle with most of the pieces missing. Still, I’d hoped the reunion might jog my memory.
It did not.
I cried as I drove home. This was yet another loss caused by the brain injury, another deficit I have to make my peace with.
We all suffer loss, and I’m no different. I should be grateful for what I have rather than whining about what I’ve lost.
It’s just so much easier to whine.
I thought about God’s call to Moses from the burning bush. God told Moses to return to Egypt and tell Pharoah to free the Israelites, whom he’d enslaved.
Moses didn’t want the job. “Oh no! They’ll kill me!” he protested.
“No, they won’t kill you,” God assured him. “I’ll be with you.”
“But I don’t even know Your name!” Moses objected.
“Tell Pharoah, ‘I AM’ sent you,” said God.
“Your name is I AM?” (That’s a rough paraphrase.) “You should get someone else,” Moses whined. “Ask my brother, Aaron. He’ll probably say yes.” Moses continued to name all the reasons he was the wrong guy for the job.
God wasn’t buying it.
Eventually, the ever-patient God changed the subject. “Moses, what do you have in your hand?”
“My hand? “Moses replied sort of stupidly, “Um, just this old stick.”
God turned the stick into a serpent, then back to a stick. That got Moses’ attention.
Eventually, Moses obeyed God. He told Pharoah that I AM sent him to release the Israelite captives. It took 10 plagues to convince Pharoah, but he finally relented.
God is not bothered by what we DON” T have or CAN’T do. He asks what we have and if we will let Him use it.
For me, God asks if I will allow Him to use me just the way I am. I see the holes in the bucket and the leaks in my brain, but God sees a beloved daughter. Where there are holes, He fills them. Where we lack, He suffices.
M. Regina Cram is a published author and parishioner of SS. Isidore and Maria Parish.
