Contributing writer
When we built my mother’s house, one of the things she wanted installed in the bathroom was a set of grab bars. She had an idea where she’d need them and we even went so far as to practice getting in and out of the shower to see where she would just normally reach so that we knew where that bar was supposed to be.
Grab bars are pretty important — not just in the bathroom, but in life in general.
When circumstances are difficult or your health goes topsy-turvy, you need something to grab onto just to steady yourself so you don’t fall.
Our friend Tony was a genius at grab bars. We’re reminded of his ingenuity daily because we have our office in his old house. Tony knew himself pretty well — where he could grab and where he shouldn’t. He had a system worked out and he had Jim installed grab bars all over the house. They weren’t those big handicap grab bars that are there for the whole world to see. Tony’s grab bars were ordinary screen door handles in all the right places on door jams.
When past the walls, Tony worked out his own configuration of chairs that helped him navigate the wide-open spaces. His ingenuity gave him the ability to live out his life as he chose. Those grab bars were lifesavers.
Grab bars come in all shapes and sizes. Friends can be like grab bars, at times. Tooltime Tim was a grab bar we didn’t even know we needed, when we came to Kansas. He wasn’t one of those shiny chrome grab bars that look like they are something they’re not. He was steady as a rock, holding the weight of country living.
Family members often function as grab bars and it’s a comfort to have them around. It’s good to know whom we can depend upon and whom we can’t. Nothing worse than grabbing on to something in a moment of crisis and finding out it can’t support the weight — even temporarily.
Money, especially a savings account, is a grab bar. It’s one of those things like that bar in the handicap section of the public toilet. You may not need it now, but later on, it could come in handy. However, money can be one of those faulty grab bars that look all pretty and shiny — that seem to be something nice that one could depend on — but when the chips are down isn’t worth squat, especially where it really counts.
Our belief system is like a grab bar, whether it’s just a philosophy of life or a religious creed. These grab bars count most when they are tested. Every once in a while, it’s good to see if they are still sturdy, if the screws are tight, if they can bear the load, or just come tumbling away from the wall like screws in drywall.
You may believe that “all things work together for good,” as it says in scripture; but like Job (also of scriptural origin) you don’t really know that for sure until trouble comes to put it to the test. Even then, it takes time to sort it all out. Meanwhile you’re holding on like mad.
A belief in Heaven, the hereafter, reincarnation, and a host of worldly experiences that we really can’t test, is a grab bar — like that bar above the door in a car. It’s there. Someday that grab bar belief could hoist you right out of this world into another place. Who knows?
Our friend Jerry has one of those fancy pick-up trucks that you need a stepladder to get into. Try navigating that entrance and exit when you’re all dressed up in a skirt and high heels.
“Grab the bar,” he says with a grin.
It’s amazing how that bar helps. I don’t need a lift or a ladder — just a steadying influence, a helping hand.
It’s another day in the country — got your grab bars in place?