An Open Letter to Nancy Reagan

This is an article that I wrote in 2004. My name back then was Kathy R. Haag. I was married. At the time, Ronald Reagan had died and his wife, Nancy, was advocating using aborted baby tissue for stem cell research to combat Alzeheimer's disease. This was an emotionally charged issue at the time. This opinion piece was published in "The Partial Observer", which is an online collection of writings from different authors.



One voice advocating stem cell research responsibly.


by Kathy R. Haag
June 18, 2004


Dear Nancy:

I, along with the rest of our nation - love, respect and admire you for many reasons. First - for being what my mother calls a "lady". When my mother utters that word, it speaks volumes. It speaks of grace, dignity, character and living one's life all the time as if everyone were always watching, even when no one is looking. Margaret Thatcher once said, "Being powerful is like being a lady. If you have to tell people that you are, you aren't." And you, Mrs. Reagan, are a lady, in the truest sense of the word.

All Americans admire your fierce, endless, faithful, loyalty to the man whom you loved. We admire his good sense to listen to the one who cared about him the most. We admired the two of you as individuals; and as a team.

Mrs. Reagan, we admired your taste and understanding of what our nation needed after the death of our former President. We thank you for the opportunity to say our good-byes and honor the man that we loved too. We felt that we had lost a family member who led this nation the same way that a strong father leads his family.

This leadership began immediately after the first inauguration, which had been carried out while Americans were held hostage in Iran. When one of our Americans is a hostage, then all of our nation is held hostage. President Reagan understood the sacredness of freedom and was committed to support it all over the world. However, before he could help to free a member of any other nation, our own had to be freed. Within 30 minutes of his presidency, this goal was accomplished. Then he moved on to help to build the bridge of freedom to the rest of the world.

I remember the excitement when I heard MY President, say "Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!" Then, months later, I got chill bumps watching the wall come down. I had tears in my eyes, understanding that history of an unbelievable magnitude was occurring in front of all of our eyes and realizing that there would be people in my generation who would never understand the significance of that moment because we have never known the kind of tyranny and oppression that occurs daily worldwide. We are the lucky ones. We have always been free.

He moved on to help to liberate the people in Grenada after they asked for our help.

I remember him bombing the palace of the Libyan leader Khadafi. After that, Mr. Khadafi was subdued - and I was thankful.

I remember pride in the fact that he was not one to push around. He believed in walking softly but carrying a big stick.

And I remember our President also knew when he had to act as a father figure to a nation in mourning. Our entire country wept and grieved together over the Space Shuttle disaster. He led us in our grief, hugged family members, and personally grieved with them - and he was sincere in his grief.

And we admired you both for taking a stance on difficult positions and not being afraid to stand strong on those positions even when it was not the most popular thing to do. Your husband said, "We didn't discover our values in a poll taken a week before the convention".

One of these difficult positions was the stance of President Reagan on the abortion issue. He and you, as I understood it were against abortion. You stood strong to that position in the face of protests, and disagreements from all directions, including within your own family. You and the President knew right from wrong and you made that clear. He said, "Abortion is advocated only by persons who have themselves been born."

I, and many other Americans supported your position. The pro-abortion camp calls themselves pro-choice. They say that they believe in the right to a woman being able to choose what she does with her body. I agree that every woman should and does have that right. The problem is that I disagree with their timing. I believe that the time to choose what to do with your body is before sex that results in conception. When deciding whether or not to engage in sex is the right time for a woman to make the choice of what to do with her body ...not after the baby has been conceived. After conception of a new life, the time of choice for what a woman should do with her fetus, which they consider to be a part of their body, should be gone.

But life has a way of putting us in positions that we had never anticipated. And it is from these bad positions, that growth occurs. And growth is painful. We are faced to look at issues from a new perspective and this is when we find out where the rubber meets the road, so to speak. We find out how we feel when this issue becomes personal. And sometimes feel forced to understand that maybe we were wrong. And sometimes we have to face the sad fact that we were right but that being right does not come without a price.

When faced with the pain of an issue that faces a loved one, we begin to do all that we can to help them. We try to help them get cured. We try to help them conquer the challenge, whatever it takes. And then one day we find out that there isn't a cure and we can't fix the problem. All we can do is to stand by and try to help ease the burden and pain and suffering on them as much as possible. And the realization that there is nothing that can be done to fix a problem for someone else after a tremendous effort results in a kind of death in itself: the death of an effective way to solve problems. No one can know the pain unless they have walked in these shoes. It is personal, heart-wrenching pain. But... for those of us who are NOT quitters and who WILL NOT sit idly by and give up, we take on a different course. We turn to activism of some form...hopefully in a positive, constructive way.

And that, my heroine, is what you have done. Even before the final demise of your husband, you stood up and publicly requested that Mr. Bush increase government funding to expand embryonic stem cell research to help to cure the afflicted...The ones who, like your husband have Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s disease and spinal injuries, just to name a few. And in their love and respect for you and your husband, many congressmen have jumped in and are trying to lobby the President to do the same. What you did took courage. You stood up and crossed party lines, publicly disagreeing with a sitting Republican President to make your voice heard. You did it with a very soft voice and a very personal cause. Nobody can help but to admire this.

A Soviet leader once said about Margaret Thatcher, your friend and your husband's ideological soul mate, "She is an lady made of iron." Upon hearing this quote, Margaret Thatcher replied,” He was right!" Well, Mrs. Reagan, please excuse my southern slang, but Margaret Thatcher ain't got nothin' on you! You too, are a lady made of iron, and you are still a lady.

But my President, Mr. George Bush, believes in limited government funding on stem cell research because of the source of the stem cells to be used: from aborted fetal tissue and from frozen embryos. When the frozen embryos are used, the taking of the stem cells from the embryos will result in the destruction of the embryo. This is a form of abortion. There are the arguments that many of these embryos would have been aborted through destruction over a period of years anyway. This probably is true. There are the arguments that a woman who is going to have an abortion will have one anyway. That no one will decide to have an abortion for stem cell research purposes but for purely private reasons and there is no need in this going for waste. As long as these very terrible things are going to happen anyway, let the tragedy be turned into something that will save a life that is already living and will soon be suffering. But that would be using government funds to help research using aborted fetuses. And George Bush has a conscience that believes in the same sacredness of life that you and Mr. Reagan used to say that you believed in too.

I know that you still believe in the sacredness of life. I think that you are still against abortion. Are you? And I believe that when President Reagan was President, if given the same issue to decide, would have decided the same exact way that Mr. President George W. Bush has. And I believe that you would have supported him staunchly. But that was before it became painfully personal for you.

I had a Grandfather who was stricken and died from Parkinson's disease. I had to watch his deterioration advance rapidly until he, too, got to the point that no one could reach him. I can tell stories, not too different from those stories told by your children. One day, when spoon-feeding him rice pudding, he looked at the nurse, who cared for him in his house and said about me, "I don't know who this girl is, but she sure is sweet". That was a sweet moment for me. I remember in the same visit when he was shuffling through the kitchen, he looked at me and had a glimmer in his eye and said, "Hi, Hon!” In addition, I was tickled because, for that brief moment, I knew he recognized me. And that was special. That was to be the last time that he recognized me. His condition continued to deteriorate to a place where we could no longer reach him, just as you described your husband. I wonder at times if they were in the same place. Then, my wonderful grandfather died. And I love him and still miss him to this day.

This issue is personally painful for me as well. But I ask you to not pressure Bush and the Congress to drop their current policy completely. There are 2 other sources for stem cells: One is from the umbilical cord blood for a healthy newborn baby and the other is from regular fat cells in the body of everyone. I personally, would like to donate all of those that I can. Do you know of a number that I can call?

Please ask our leaders to increase funding for stem cell research on stem cells emanating from the cord blood of newborns and from normal fat cells. And I think that this is a compromise that we can all champion without an attack on our conscience.

Our leaders are anxious to help with this cause out of love for their former President and his family. The timing is right for positive change. But we must realize that this must be done the right way, not with an knee-jerk emotional reaction thinking that had we done this sooner, Mr. Reagan would still be with us. His quality of life would probably have been much better. But the truth is that we are all mortal and 93 years of life is not bad at all.

After life

Hosea 13:14 " ...Where, O death, are your plagues?
Where, O grave, is your destruction? "



I was blessed with the best grandmother ever. We called her Mamaw.

All of my young life, my family regularly traveled the three hours northeast from Brewton, Alabama to Opelika, Alabama, where my Mamaw and Bampa lived. As soon as we arrived, we were greeted by my grandparents, and immediately ushered into the lighted kitchen, where we were fed, regardless of whether or not we had eaten dinner. After eating what was usually a warm bowl of macaroni soup, we never had trouble sleeping.

Our Mamaw and Bampaw, they were quite a pair.

They were married 68 years when my grandfather passed away. Mamaw passed away a few years after that.

When Mamaw went into the hospital for the last time, she knew that things were bad and she told my mom to call all of us and let us know to come. So, I packed up my one year old son Levi and went to Opelika straight to the East Alabama Medical Center to visit her in the hospital. I had someone to come and get Levi so I could stay as long as I felt comfortable. She was having trouble breathing. Her lungs were damaged from radiation treatment that she had received as part of treatment for breast cancer years before. The cancer was eradicated for a few years and then returned into her bones.

My uncle Jack was at the hospital, sitting with her and trying to help her to feel secure. But she kept asking for my mom, who had been at the hospital all day and had gone home to get some rest. I stayed a while, and then went home to her house.

Uncle Jack came to the house the next morning and announced that Mamaw was resting comfortably. I think that she was in a coma. I went to the hospital and had to leave because my son needed a nap and could not sleep at the hospital. I left with him and got a motel room where he could sleep without any distractions. While at the motel, my cousin, Toppy arrived to inform me that Mamaw passed away. My mom had sent her there to tell me so that she wouldn't have to do it over the phone. I cried and thanked her and got Levi ready to go to the hospital to see her before she was removed for the funeral home.

When I arrived, there was a full room of family waiting to go into her room. There were also close neighbors and the aides who worked at the house helping her to do housework and dress. I went around the room hugging people one by one, telling each one that my grandmother loved him or her dearly. Every single one of them responded by saying, "I know, she told me all the time."

What a gift she had to let people know how much they meant to her while she was still alive.

We went into her hospital room to say our last goodbyes and to see her peaceful before they left with her to go to the funeral home.

I returned to the motel and got a nap with Levi. After we awoke, I was praying on my knees. I was praying for her soul and that God would take her in his loving arms in heaven. It was then that I saw an image of Mamaw in my mind. She was dressed up and her hair was fixed nice and she had on makeup and looked very pretty. She told me that she was so happy; for me not to worry about her because she was OK. She said that if she had known about how wonderful that place was before she came, she would have gone a long time ago.

At that point my grief was immediately replaced with joy. I thanked God for her life and for taking care of her.

I related this story to my family and told them what a comfort it was to receive such a message. Some of them were comforted by this.

And now, I go through life with the assurance that what we are doing on this earthly plain is very important. But I believe that the real living will be with Jesus in heaven.

I still miss Mamaw. But I still have comfort from this image of her after death. And I am assured that if I press on toward the prize, I will see her again.

"Where, O death, is your victory?
Where, O death, is your sting?"-- I Corinthians 15:55

Patton

I was chillin'. It was the last day of school and school was over. Hallelujah! No more days of having to wake up uncooperative boys to get them ready for school. Nope. Not for 3 more months.

Since I knew that we were all safe to sleep in, and two of my boys were spending the night with friends, I lounged on the couch (Yes, I am from time to time a couch potato), and turned the TV on to a movie channel. That particular night, they were having a special weekend of nothing but war movies. And the particular movie that was on was "Patton." Seeing this movie again brought back a flood of memories.

This is a movie that I have watched numerous times. This is an old favorite for me. And I can never watch it without remembering the first time that I saw it at the old Ritz Theatre in my hometown.

I went with my sister. I was in 3rd or 4th grade. I don't remember the rating, but I do remember that I heard more cursing in one place than I had ever heard in my life. Back then, cursing was a really big deal. Now, not so much. And not only was I amazed by all of the foul language, but there was a man in the movie theatre who laughed every time that Patton cursed in the movie. He didn't just chuckle, he laughed out loud, very loudly. And I can remember that my sister and I wound up watching this man almost as much as we did the movie, because, well, to tell the truth, he was making a scene in the theater. But we couldn't say anything, because he was an adult, and we were just kids.

Whenever I see the movie "Patton" to this day, I think of this man. Who was he? Is he still alive? Does he still watch this movie? Does he still laugh when he hears the vulgarity? What in the world was so funny in the first place?

I especially like the scene in the movie where Patton is talking about feeling like he had participated in the great battles in history in a former life. This scene is mystical, and arouses my curiousity about life after death.

After watching this movie at the theater, I remember checking out a biography of General Patton in our school's library. The movie definitely made me more interested in this important figure in the military history of our nation.

And last of all, this movie reminds me of a story told by my grandmother. My grandmother, Mamaw, we called her, lived in Opelika, Alabama. This is about 30 minutes to an hour from the Georgia line. And along the Alabama-Georgia border is the Chattahoochee River. The same one that was written about in a country-western song.

According to my grandmother's story, General Patton was stationed at Fort Benning, Georgia during World War II. This was about 1 to 2 hours away from Mamaw's house in Opelika. Fort Benning was near Columbus, Georgia, which is said to be a sister-city to Phenix City, Alabama. The two cities are separated by the famous Chattahoochee River and the Alabama-Georgia state line.

At that time in history, Phenix City, Alabama was referred to as "sin city." The legend has it that Phenix City was as dangerous as any city in the nation. There was a big prostitution and gambling ring in that area at that time. The corruption and resulting crime was so bad at one point, that Marshall Law was implemented for a few weeks to get the city under control.

One night, quite a few of General Patton's soldiers went in to "sin city" to have a good time and apparently succeded. But too much so, for they were arrested and put in to jail. The problem for General Patton was that his soldiers were to deploy in the next couple of days, and he felt that he needed them. So he contacted the authorities in Phenix City to request that his soldiers be released from jail so that they could deploy. The officials would not comply.

So, the story goes that General Patton got angry and insisted that his soldiers be released. Again, the local officials refused. General Patton informed them that if they did not release his soldiers, he would have the army to surround that jail and blow it up to get release for his men. They still refused. (As I type this, it is starting to remind me of the story of Moses and the Pharoah).

General Patton, led the Army's 2nd armoured division's tanks on the highway across the bridge over the Chattahoochee River into Phenix City, and lined the tanks up in front of the jail where his men were held. Again, he told the officials that they had one more chance to free his men before he attacked the jail with his tanks.

This time, they acquiesced. The soldiers were released from jail and General Patton moved his tanks back over the bridge and on to Fort Benning. The rest of the story, well that is history.

But every time I rode with Mamaw over that bridge, she would tell that story that all of the locals knew, but many people in other parts of the country did not. I think of that story every time I watch the movie "Patton".

No obituary

When I was growing up, I had a friend, who I will call Jim, for the sake of privacy.

Jim was rather cute--not drop-dead gorgeous, mind you, but cute. He was a little short, and had a nice tan, and a quick smile. He had brown hair mixed with gray. That was very unusual. It was one of the first things you noticed about him when you met him. He also had patches of light pigmentation on his eyelids and various other places. The patch on his eyelids looked somewhat like eye makeup.

We spent a lot of time together in the neighborhood with all of our other friends. We all rode bicycles together, played spotlight, baseball, football, kickball, listened to the radio, attended school, played and ran in the woods and the field together, talked on the phone and anything else we could dream up. Once or twice, I think that we even played spin-the-bottle.

We also shared the same birthday. He was born exactly 1 year before me.

Jim had a mother who had been divorced a couple of times. That was a little unusual back in those days, but not completely rare. She was married to a new man. She had daughters by that man. They were Jim's half sisters. And the new man adopted Jim.

Jim's biological father had deserted him and would have nothing to do with him. None of us in the neighborhood had ever seen him.He didn't talk about it much and we didn't ask. We didn't know what to ask. We didn't know much about a world in which someones father would desert them.

Although Jim was adopted by this man, they weren't close. He didn't spend time with Jim. He was just there. But being there is more than Jim's biological father had done.
And Jim's mom? She pretty much ignored him too. She took her daughters shopping for new clothes and other stuff. But not Jim. One sister was a cheerleader and got absolutely anything that she wanted. It was as if Jim didn't exist to his mom.

Time marched on, we grew up, moved and went our separate ways. But, from time to time, we would run into Jim in various places--the grocery store or the hospital. We heard that he ran off and eloped with a girl, just before her parents had the marriage annulled.

Then we heard that he got married a few years later. I saw him in the grocery store. He said that his wife was in labor having his baby. But he wasn't going to go to the hospital. He was going to go get drunk. That was what his father did when he was born. So he thought that it was the appropriate thing for him to do, too.


I stayed close to a few of the people from the old, dear neighborhood. I got updates from acquaintances about Jim and some of our other mutual friends.

About 2 months ago, a friend from home and I were talking on the phone. She told me that Jim had called her out of the blue. It seems that he was going through a divorce--which number, we didn't know. But it wasn't the first. He had also recently lost his job that he had for many years working in a factory. He was bragging to my friend about how many possessions he had and how much money he had been making. Well, that is, before he lost his job. And, of course, his soon to be ex-wife was trying to take everything from him. It seems that he kept talking about himself and forgot to ask about my friend very much, so she finally ended the conversation after he told her that if she got lucky, he would come and take her out on a date. I think that she told him that she really didn't want to be that lucky.

About a month or two later, I was talking to her on the phone again. She told me that another friend of ours, I'll call him Joe, had told her that Jim died. At one time in life, Joe and Jim were best friends. She asked what happened and Joe said that he didn't really know. He said that Jim was drinking about a quart of hard liquor every morning, and up to a gallon before 24 hours had passed. He guessed that had killed him.

I had a lot of questions. What day had he died? What was the official cause of death? Had he been sick? Had he been hospitalized? Where was he buried? Where was the funeral? Which funeral home had his family used? My friend did not know the answers to any of these questions.

But my curiosity was piqued. We had all grown apart over the years, but I still had an affection for someone with whom we had been so close at one time. So, I began a search for the answers to these questions.

I could find no obituary in any newspaper, no funeral listing at any funeral home, no evidence that he had died at all. I went back to my friend and asked again. We were confused. I did another search on the Internet and finally found a listing that listed Jim as deceased as of 2011 at the age of 50.

That's it. Nothing else. No mention of him on a listing of people in his community who had died. No obituary. No listing at any mortuary in the town where he lived or in any town or city nearby. It was as if he died, and was either left in the spot where he died, and was still there, or, even worse, he died and nobody cared. Nobody. Not even enough to bury him with a proper funeral. Not even a mention in the local newspaper.

I furthered my search and asked my friends on facebook if they knew about his death. I got only one response from a mutual friend asking what happened. I responded that I didn't know; that I had heard that he had died, but that I hadn't been able to get any information since then.

That ended the search. I found a phone number for his mom, but I didn't call. I figured that it would be too awkward.

I think to myself, how sad for someone with living family to die and nobody even notice. Nobody even wrote an obituary. I wondered if he has been buried. I think that it would be terribly sad to live for 50 years, and then die and not even get an obituary. I shudder to think that it could happen to me. I wanted to write him an obit. So, here it is:

Jim, Born Sept 3, 1961. Died March 5, 2011

Jim, was born and lived in Brewton, Alabama most of his life.He enjoyed sports during his young life. He liked to hang out with friends. And he was a ladies man even at a young age.
Later in life, he married, fathered several children, and held down a job for years before his untimely death at the age of 50.
He is survived by his mother, Virginia Smith, of Cantonment, Florida and her husband, Mr. Smith, a wife, several children, and two sisters.
He is also survived by childhood friends, who will probably miss him the most of anybody.

There. Now he has an obituary. Rest in peace, my childhood friend......

Provision

I have had pastors and Sunday school teachers who repeatedly taught me that it is good to memorize scripture for a number of reasons. One of these reasons is to be ready when hard times come. When we can recite scripture to speak to our problems, we receive strength to endure the difficulties. This is actually an example of faith in action.

So when I had one of these experiences, I found scripture to be very reassuring.

On Wednesday, December 13, 2000, as I was cooking dinner, I hoped that my husband would get home in time to babysit our children so that I could attend Wednesday night church service. I heard a knock at the door. When I answered the door, I found a friend standing in front of me with the news that my husband Greg, had been in a car accident. He had accidentally run his truck into a tree on a dirt road near her house. She told me that he was not seriously hurt, but only banged up a little. For precaution, he had been transported to the hospital by ambulance. He would be ok, but he would need me to go to the hospital to get him. His truck was totaled.

I turned off supper, made quick arrangements for a babysitter for my 3 boys, and drove to the hospital. He was laying on a table in the emergency room screaming in pain, and telling me that he was convinced that his hip was broken. He was right.

Because of internal bleeding, the hospital in our hometown transferred him to Sacred Heart Hospital, in Pensacola, Florida. He had emergency surgery there to realign his leg into the hip socket and was put into traction. The Dr. diagnosed him as having an acetabular fracture of the hip. (His hip socket was crushed.) In addition, he would need a surgery that could be done at only 5 different places in the country. One of these was Tulane Hospital in New Orleans, La. (pre-Katrina).


After his surgery that night, he lay in the bed, in pain and worrying about the consequences of his wreck: he wouldn't be able to work for quite a while, we would have extra Dr. bills, how would we pay bills without him working?

Me, I had a different outlook. I was thankful that he wasn't killed, wasn't hurt worse, and that the kids weren't with him at the time of the accident. I knew that with God's help, we would find a way.


He would say, "How are we going to pay our bills?"

My response was, "My God shall supply all of our needs according to His riches in glory, in Christ Jesus. I am not going to worry. I am just going to trust God. He will take care of us." (This scripture is from Philippians 4:19)

I didn't just speak the scripture. I believed that it was true. Several times that night, he repeated his worries. And I would repeat this scripture back to him.

Four days later, Greg was transferred to Tulane Hospital. Three days after that, he was in a 13 hour surgery where his hip was repaired.


In the meantime, I was driving back and forth from my home in Brewton, Alabama to New Orleans, after getting people to keep my children while I was gone. When I returned home, I worked. Then, I went back to New Orleans to see Greg. This was a very stressful, hectic time for our family. Not only that, but because of the traveling, money became very tight.

One day, I received a phone call from a member of my church. She wanted to do something special for our family because she knew that we were having a difficult time. She and her husband wanted to buy us some boxes of food from the Angel food ministries, and she wanted to know if I would mind if she did this. Some people wouldn't accept help and she didn't want to offend me in any way, but they wanted to do something to help us. I accepted her very gracious offer.

A few days later, my friends arrived with the food boxes. After they left, I began to put the groceries away and then sat down to take a break. As I looked on the side of the boxes, I saw that there was writing on the side of the box. I could not begin what I saw as I began to read the following: "My God shall supply all of your needs according to his riches in glory, in Christ Jesus." I laughed, as I thought about this. My heart lept with joy.

I had received my affirmation that in spite our our dire circumstances, God would provide. He does so through other believers. And He is always faithful to keep his word to us. Amen.

Hound dogs

This is a true story that occurred in my childhood.

My paternal grandparents resided in a small house in Melbourne, Florida. They lived next door to a family of four: Mom and Dad, and 2 college age children, a girl and a boy. This was a talented and very active family. The Mom painted, the daughter was an award winning horse barrel racer and everyone in the family had their private pilot's license. I think that only the Mom and Dad had instrument licenses, but they were all licensed to fly.

So, it is no surprise that they made weekend trips by plane. They had done so one weekend, and were going to fly home, during a foggy Sunday evening. They were advised not to, because of the fog, which causes unsafe conditions, but they were determined, because they had to be home on Monday morning to attend work and school. So, they took off.

They never arrived.

They were reported missing on Monday morning. A search ensued. They were not immediately found.

In the meantime, my mother and father were very concerned. They figured that our friends had crashed and died. All week, my father, who was a very good sleeper, continued to wake up during the night, thinking about our friends. This caused him to get very tired at work. So, finally, he decided to take some personal days off from work to join the search party.

In the meantime, my Mom put in a phone call to a friend who lived in Mobile, Alabama, named Tommy. This woman had a prophetic gift. She could tell the future, although she was very judicious about it and would not do this but for a few people, so as not to attract attention to herself. My mom was one of the people for whom she would do this.

My mom called her and told her about the situation and asked Tommy if the family would be located. Tommy told her yes. The question was asked about the location of the plane and Tommy was unsure about this. So, my mom asked if she knew who would find them. Tommy replied that it would be a man with 2 hound dogs. So, after a few more unfruitful questions, they ended their call and my mom related all of this information to my dad.

A full week passed without any success with the search. The next weekend, our family loaded up with one of my cousins, and went to the Silver Sands Motel in Destin, Florida to stay. My mom would take the kids to the beach, while my dad joined the search. The authorities had determined that the plane had crashed somewhere near where we were in Florida. My dad joined the team. He flew by helicopter to look. He spotted the wreckage on the ground. The helicopter landed near the wreckage and the scene was surveyed. While the emergency responders did their job, my dad smuggled a couple of small pieces of the plane wreckage for a keepsake from this disastrous event.

He returned to the motel where we stayed, thankful to have located the wreckage, but still sad about the loss of life. The bodies and wreckage were recovered. The family was returned home for a proper burial.

That night, a terrible storm hit Destin. The lightening was close, the thunder was loud and the rain poured. It was so bad, that on 2 occasions during the storm as we tried to sleep, sparks flew out of the receptacles in the wall of our room. One time that it did that, my cousin jumped over my sister. The next morning, many of the boats at the pier were 1/2 submerged with all of the rain water halfway filling them. People were having to bail water out of their boats for quite awhile.

According to the authorities, the location where the plane wreckage was found would have normally been in a swamp. But that particular year, Florida was experiencing a drought. The terrible storm that came through Destin filled the swamp back up. Had the wreckage not been found when it was, it would not have been located until another drought, which could have been years later.

We returned to our home to settle back into our normal life. The night we returned, my mom and dad were discussing the recent events and how Tommy had obviously been wrong about the man who would find the wreckage. It was very odd for her to be wrong. If Tommy wasn't sure about something, she would usually say, "I don't know". My mom commented that she had never known of Tommy to be wrong and my Dad agreed. My mom asked if anyone with hound dogs was anywhere near the scene, and my dad said, "no". They decided to drop the issue and go on to bed.

My dad had a habit of sitting on his bed, removing his boots, and placing them in the box that they came in when he bought them. His nightly routine was underway, when my mom heard him called out to her. When she answered, he told her to come here and look at something.

On the side of the box was the name brand of his boots: Hound Dogs. The man with the two hound dogs had located the wreckage.

The forgiveness of a child

It was a typical school day morning, when, my voice raised to a high screaming pitch and decibel level that would make an announcer proud. My boys were ignoring my instructions to get out of bed, and prepare for their day at school. This was typical.

What wasn't typical was my frustration level, which was normally high in the mornings, but on this particular day, much higher than normal. So, accordingly, my reactions to them and responses were less endearing than I would have liked.

Then, IT happened. I uttered the words that I would come to regret. You know what I am talking about: the kind of hurtful words that can not be taken back once they leave our lips. The "end of the argument" words. I had failed to tame my tongue and immediately, I realized the damage. My 10-year old son was crying hard. I, with my insensitive demeanor, had not only upset him, but I had shattered his world. Nobody can inflict emotional pain on us more than the people whom we love. I am not immune to this. And I was terribly sorry.

I had to backtrack; to try to take back the hurtful words; but there was no way. I was left with only one option: to apologize.

I went to my son, more gentle now. I said, "Son, I am so very sorry. I did not mean what I said. What I said was hurtful and I shouldn't have said it, because it doesn't reflect my true feelings."

And in a very weak, pitiful voice, Rusty answered me by saying, "OK".

I said, "You know, sometimes you get upset and angry and say things that you do not mean?" He nodded. I said,"Well, that happens to parents too. I really didn't mean it."

Again, in a very pitiful voice, he said, "OK, Mama." By this time I was sitting and hugging, holding and rocking him. And he was hugging me tightly, with his head on my shoulder.

I said, " I need to ask you to forgive me. Will you, will you forgive me?"

He answered, "OK, Mama". But as he spoke, his voice was so weak, and so pitiful, that it broke my heart.

I knew that he would truly forgive me. I knew that we loved and still do love each other very much. I needed his forgiveness and he needed my apology. Without my apology, his world was shattered. With it, it was temporarily broken, but on the mend. He needed me to apologize. And both of us needed his forgiveness. And he gave it to me easily. And I am so very thankful.

I explained to him that if he would get ready for school, we would stop by a restaurant, and I would buy him a special breakfast, and we would eat together, just him and me. Hopefully, this would help to restore the relationship that I had so quickly damaged. A smile replaced his tears and we set out on our breakfast adventure happily. He made it to school and had a good day.

But this was not an insignificant incident. I don't know whether or not he remembers it. But I do. And as I remember, I still feel the hurt that I experienced at watching him hurt.

Since then, I haven't broken his heart again with my sometimes short fuse. I hope I don't ever repeat this mistake with him or anyone.

And I am so happy that I received his forgiveness, which I didn't deserve. No one forgives as easily and quickly as a child. We adults can learn from them. Especially since we were once children. What has happened to us to make us learn to do differently? Why don't we forgive as easily as our children? Is it age? Is it bad experiences? Is it because. over time, we have learned to emotionally insulate ourselves, thinking that this insulation will protect us from being hurt? Does this work at all?

I had related this story to my prayer group, and one of the ladies told me, "Yeah, we adults say that we forgive, but actually it is more like saying 'I forgive you', when actually, we are secretly thinking, 'but I am going to keep my eye on you from here on out'. We have learned as adults to do everything conditionally. We love conditionally we forgive conditionally.

Maybe we should learn from our children what we have unlearned. Maybe we should put ourselves in a position, with the help of the Holy Spirit, to forgive as easily and quickly as our children do. Will we get hurt? Yes. Will we get hurt anyway? Yes. Will we be more vulnerable? Absolutely! But, will our relationships be more rich, more abundant and fruitful? Yes. Will God be better pleased? I think so.


I think that is what Jesus meant when he said, "Come like a child".