One of the more satisfying physical sensations in life is feeling the subsiding of pain, actually, consciously feeling it go away, degree by degree, moment by moment.

You're probably thinking, Boy, I can think of a hundred other more satisfying physical sensations. So can I. But if you've ever experienced mounting, excruciating pain and then felt it go away, you're going to rank that pretty high.

Am I leading you to think I've been experiencing pain recently? I haven't been, other than a nagging headache now and then, a sore heel and a wasp sting. A wasp sting gets my quick attention and is soon over, covered up with a paste of baking soda. Minor League, stings, unless you're allergic to them. You're talking Big League when you mention angina, child birth, root canal, kidney stones and assorted others.

Let us consider the wasp or hornet sting. Unless you're allergic to such stings, which can be life threatening, you can still walk around and talk to people and know you're going to live. But, suppose you have a bladder infection. About all you can do is sit real still and wait, ticking off the seconds in your crunched-up brain until you feel, actually feel, the medicine, if you took it, taking effect. You hope that no one speaks to you or even sees you or touches you, for your whole being is consumed with the waiting for the pain to subside and hoping the shelf life of the medicine you've taken hasn't expired.

And then comes that infinitesimal relief. Can you believe it? Wait, now. Is it really letting up? You dare to move an inch or two to see if the jar makes any difference. No, it isn't any better. Still cringing, squeezing pain. Or is it maybe a forth of a degree better? Yes, yes, you're coming up out of the pits. You visualize that little pill you took breaking into miniature, armed soldiers flanking and surrounding the enemy and winning the battle. You dare to look up to see if the world is still going on. The pain is receding like a tide going out. Moment by moment by moment. Oh, what a wonderful thing is medicine. Thank you, thank you, whoever needs to be thanked the doctor, the medicine maker, the research laboratories, the employer or government who as furnished you enough money to go to the doctor and to get the medicine.

Not a lot of masters with words have described their own pain. Keats hints at longing for~ death as an escape from pain when he poetically speaks to the nightingale, telling the bird, while listening to it, that "Now more than ever seems it rich to die, to cease upon the midnight with no pain ..." Our modern everyday speaker would not put it so lyrically. He'd probably say only, in an understated way, "It was so bad I thought I'd die. Almost want to." And it wouldn't get much sympathy.

Some saintl~y souls would say that they find relief by dedicating their pain to God giving it to Him as a sort of oblation. I can think of a million things I'd rather give as such a gift or sacrifice than my pain.

David Grayson, one of my favorite authors, writes~ a whole chapter on pain and what h~e concluded about it. At first, when it wasn't so bad, he speaks philosophically about it~, asking himself if he thought he could have the good without the bad, joy without sorrow, rest without labor. Then, as the spasms of pain increase~, he calls it the grim, primeval terror and speaks,~ somewhat like Keats, of death being kind.

Then, as he sinks deeper into pain he holds on desperately to a quotation from Marcus Aurelius who said, "Nothing happens to any man which he is not formed by nature to ~bear," which sounds a lot like a Bible verse I know.

Then Grayson tried the technique of Endurance just give pain the whole field. Let it rage. Be the master of your soul and spirit and let the pain ravage the body. But this he says, rests upon the ~assumptionthat body and spirit ~can~ be separated while still living.

At last Grayson came upon the reality that "This pain will not last; it never has lasted. If I can endure, I shall soon be at peace. If I cannot endure it I will still have peace, unwakingly, wholly at peace. Thus he came to the unalterable human condition, "It will change."

So we have today, "Change is the only constant." Will that help you any when the cut nerves of your molar are throbbing, thrashing around like a mad Tasmanian devil caught in a steel trap? Try it while you're giving the medicine time to work and experiencing that eventually satisfying, physical experience of feeling pain go away or else.

REJOICE!

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