Warning: Low levels

You may recognize the warning icon.  It illuminates in vehicles when the tire pressure is low and has fallen below the prescribed PSI.  In recent years I have felt like it’s been the bane of my existence. Ok, maybe that’s a little dramatic; it’s just been a pain in the ass.

The first time I saw this icon pop up, I was driving our new-to-us Toyota Sienna and it was an extremely cold winter day in January, 2009.  We had only had the van for a couple of months, so everything about the vehicle was still quite new to me, including this warning light.   I looked it up in the manual, figured out what it meant, and then tried my best to determine whether I really had an issue with one of the tires, or if it was just an effect of the frigid winter temperatures.

It seemed like every couple of months, that warning light in the Sienna would go on, even though a check of the tires showed they were pretty close to where they needed to be.  Maybe a PSI of 33 instead of 35 … but just enough of a dip in pressure to activate the signal.  We had some service work done on the Sienna a couple of weeks ago and the mechanic at the garage told me that the diagnostic check of the van’s systems indicated everything was in good working order except that the low tire pressure sensor needed to be replaced.  No doubt because the annoying thing was lit up so much of the time.

I remember that very cold day in January of 2009 when that warning light first went on because my husband was quite ill and in the hospital. I was balancing my time between being with him at the hospital, being at home looking after the boys who were then aged 10, 12, 14 and 16, and being at work.  It was a stressful time, and I know I didn’t always manage the stress very well. 

If people would come equipped with a warning light that indicated low energy levels, tiredness, fatigue and emptiness, I believe mine would often be lit up with blinking strobe lights, beeps and sirens, because there are so many days that I feel like I am completely flat and running on empty.

But I come by the tiredness and fatigue honestly since I have had low iron levels for quite a number of years.  The doctor called me the other day with the results of my recent blood tests and she said “Good news!  Your iron levels haven’t gone down!”  My iron levels actually went up … one point.  My doctor and I joked that at this rate, maybe my iron levels will be up to where they should be by the time I’m 80.

So we just traded in the Sienna for a newer, smaller used vehicle.  However within the first week of having this wonderful new vehicle, the low tire pressure warning light has come on twice!  I know which tire is the offending one and will need to have it checked out to make sure any slow leak is fixed. 

But once again, it feels like this low pressure warning light is in my face as an ongoing issue.  I’m wondering if I need to acknowledge that warning light, not just to check the air pressure in the tires of the vehicle, but also to conduct a personal inventory of sorts to see whether I’m running on empty too.

When my husband was in the hospital, a friend came to visit  and handed me a little silver heart.  It was a solid, tangible item that I could hold on to; to remind me that we were loved and cared for.  I would get dressed in the morning to go to the hospital or to work and I put that little silver heart in my pocket and throughout the day I would touch it and be reminded that I wasn’t alone.  During those days, that little silver heart was a conduit to fill me with peace and calm, and a tangible reminder of the love of Jesus.

What kinds of things, activities and relationships do I fill and re-fill myself with?  Pumping air into the car tires is an easy fix to turn that warning light off and remedy the problem, but what do I pour into myself, and pour myself into, to boost my life-levels?  Where do I go?  Who do I turn to?