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This I believe: we will commune with endurance

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Image: Mark Andersen | Rubberball Productions | Getty Images

Many beliefs have fallen away from me, like leaves in an autumn storm. It is hard to trust in maternal instinct when you have bandaged a child whose mother set her in a bath of scalding water. Difficult to believe in love when your husband is choking you because he doesn’t like how you washed his shirts. Of what use is  God when you witness friend after beautiful friend die a horrible death from AIDS.

This remains: a belief in the day after, the continuing, the clean up. I am a nurse. I am not a doctor. I don’t try and cheat death. I offer comfort, a smile, a skilled hand. For many days I will open my eyes in the morning and I will have a choice. To find joy or not. To help or not. To continue or not.

And when I come across an old tree I will ask my companions to join hands and try and encircle its trunk. We will commune with endurance. This I believe.

“We Will Commune with Endurance,” Copyright © 2005 by Alexis Sackor. Part of the This I Believe Essay Collection found at www.thisibelieve.org, Copyright © 2005-2009, This I Believe, Inc. Reprinted with permission.

This I Believe
Based on a 1950s radio program of the same name, This I Believe® is an exciting national project that invites you to write about the core beliefs that guide your daily life. The series has enjoyed a four year run on NPR's Morning Edition and All Things Considered. Visit the special "Scrubs Magazine Reader Submission Form" on the This I Believe website to contribute your own essay. Essays by Scrubs Magazine readers could be featured on both This I Believe and on Scrubs Magazine!

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