I want to tell you about my friend, Elizabeth Krynski. We have had quite an adventure together this past week. Elizabeth will be 93 in February. She lives alone in her own home near downtown Durham. She moved there with her beloved John about 40 years ago. Elizabeth uses a walker to steady her slowing pace but she is still driving and loves to tell about her trip to the DMV last year to renew her license. “They are so nice there”, she says, “they kept telling me what a great job I was doing. You know, they love to see you do well, there.”

Elizabeth was a school teacher and still loves to read and teach. We have had many good conversations about books and the wonderful experiences of 93 good and healthy years. She is incisive and articulate and a pleasure to converse with. She is a committed member of our Women of Titus Two group and has always brought an interesting perspective to our discussions.

I count it a privilege to have been there in 1989, when she and John visited our church for the first time and received Jesus Christ as their Lord and Saviour after Paul Gordon gave an invitation. Paul and John were friends from political activities and shared the same Jewish heritage. She tells the story about how John took her hand and led her to the front to answer the call. She said it was so unlike John that she wasn’t sure what was happening. Of course, the Lord knew exactly what was happening! He called John home to heaven 3 days later. Elizabeth says, “John didn’t have much time to practice being a Christian.” She loved and highly respected her husband of 37 years. He was the only child of Polish-Jewish immigrants who came to this country to escape the horrors of the Nazi invasion of Poland during WWII. He was a professor of Slavic languages at Duke University. She still misses him and talks about him frequently. Did I forget to mention that Elizabeth is a published poet? Here is my favorite poem she has written about John:

To M.J.K.

Your names flash through my years

Like white milestones

Measuring off my life.

Magnus, John, Jan,

Janek, Johnny, Janeczeck,

and nicknames -

Cryptic, private

not made for

Cold linear print.

My own life rests

On the scaffold of your names.

I cling onto the hook of J

Stand on the slant of K

Seek shelter in the tents of M

Your names

Like a flurry of

“cartes des visites”

drift through my life.

I was also privileged to be at Elizabeth’s baptism in the Atlantic Ocean in 1989. What a joyous moment seeing her face as she emerged from the water! Now that you know a little bit about her, let me tell you about our adventure.

Elizabeth had arrived at the church last Friday for the WOTT meeting and was attempting to remove her walker from the trunk of her car. She stepped back, lost her balance and fell face down on the asphalt. Her fall resulted in two lost front teeth, 9 stitches in her lip, bruised hands and scratched glasses. There was so much blood that we were all a bit alarmed! Again, the Lord granted me another privilege concerning Elizabeth’s life – we went to the ER together for a long ordeal and to the dentist to have one of her cracked teeth removed (she still has all of her own teeth – now minus 2). She has yet to complain!?! I was being mentored in the art of “attitude while growing old gracefully!” Of course, she was a bit worried and every now and then a little fear would overtake her, but she would just shake it off and remember all the good things God had done for her. Always, thankful for the smallest thing and especially that she did not break any bones! I have spent a night and a couple of days with her, as have some of the other women, until she regains her confidence and starts to mend. What a treat to beable to sit with her and talk and laugh about so many things; to be able to serve this incredibly positive woman. I have been so blessed and encouraged about gratitude, humility, courage and determination.

“Thank you, Lord, please continue to bless and heal my dear friend, Elizabeth.”