“Is this Carrie?” a voice asked on my phone as I was making supper. A voice calling from the hospital across the street from me.

I answered yes at which point he introduced himself as the ICU critical care doctor.

“I’m calling to let you know Chuck is still having trouble clearing secretions in his throat. We are getting ready to do another bronchoscopy.”

“Ok.” Because what else could I say? It was the second time they had had to clear his lungs in 24 hours since being extubated after the stroke.

“If we need to do another one tomorrow, we will have to do a tracheostomy to help him breathe.”

“Ok.” Again, what else…

That was almost five months ago. Since then we have come home and found our new, post-stroke routine, our new normal.

And the dog days of summer have ushered in what look a little more like ordinary days.

This week, for example, I’ve driven Cody to YMCA flag football camp and Chuck to (significantly fewer) medical appointments, during which I run errands.

I’ve also encountered reminders this week about ordinary days.

A pastor whose posts I follow shared a picture he took of an ordinary summer day – after his morning meditation reminded him to look for the unique beauty in his ordinary day. He also shared this quote from the meditation:

“Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the moments that take our breath away.”

Then yesterday morning, the first email I read was titled, “A blessing for ordinary days.” She asked for God to help her notice Him on “this dumb, ordinary day” when she otherwise might rush right past Him. She also included a quote:

“Earth is so thick with divine possibility that it is a wonder we can walk anywhere without cracking our shins on altars.” ~Barbara Brown Taylor

Then last night after the house was quiet, I saw one more quote:

“The world is a place where the extraordinary can sit just beside the ordinary with the thinnest of boundaries.” ~Jodi Picoult

Today was an ordinary day.

Summer rec, appointments, errands.

All of us alive.

All of us breathing. On our own.

What an extraordinary day.

Then the Lord God formed the man out of the dust from the ground and breathed the breath of life into his nostrils, and the man became a living being.

Genesis 2:7