Thankjs Junie

Thank you so much Junie for posting this. !!!!

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Don't measure your life by the breaths you have taken but by the breath taking moments you've expereinced.

All She has

All She Has

Connie Ellison

“Hey, honey!” I said brightly, hugging my seven-year-old, Jean Prince, tightly as she got off the bus. “How was school today?”



“Well, not so real good,” she replied, looking glum. “Everyone has their pictures on the Reading Bulletin Board but me. I never get my picture up, not for math or reading or anything.” Her shoulders slumped, and her chin began a definite quiver.




I’d like to believe that, with enough educational therapists, visits to the doctor, experimenting with different medications for ADHD, and drill, practice, and patience at home, I can turn my Jean into a valedictorian, a teacher’s “dream child,” the wiz kid who gets everything right and never colors outside the lines.



But I can’t. And every failure is yet another blow to me, as well as to Jean. Taking a deep breath, I turned on the “building self-esteem” mode. “Well, Hon, I’m sorry. But I’ll bet something good happened in school today, didn’t it? What was the best thing that you did today?” Jean took her own sweet time, thinking things through. She wasn’t, however, on the verge of tears anymore.



Finally, she brightened a bit and said, I gave my bunny from the prize box to Jeffrey when he fell down and cried ’cause his knee bled. Mrs. Lawrence said she was proud of me, and she put my name on the ‘Character Counts’ tree.”



“Sweetie, that’s great!” I blessed Mrs. Lawrence in my mind yet again.



The next day, we were reading the weather report in the paper, ever mindful of the science curriculum, which this month was focusing on weather and the change of seasons. As I was trying to help Jean sound out “partly cloudy,” she grabbed the paper and shrieked, “Mommy! Mommy! Why is that lady crying, Mommy? She’s holding those two little kitties, and she’s crying! Why?” I sighed. We were distracted from the task at hand yet again--something that happens with Jean on a minute-by-minute basis.



“Well, let’s read the story, Sweetie,” I replied, hoping to turn the task into yet another school lesson. “It says here that the lady is Mrs. Hamilton, and she lost her home yesterday when lightning struck it.” I read on, and the story was indeed a heartbreaking one. The poor woman from the small town of Monroe had lost everything--even her pet dog--and had no insurance.



“Hmm, Jean,” I concluded. “It says here that Pastor Barry (our minister) is taking donations for Mrs. Hamilton. We’ll make sure to give him a check tomorrow at church to help her out, okay?” Then I went off to locate Jean’s elusive three-year-old brother, James Moses, and begin dinner.



The next day, as I was trying to herd the crew out the door for Sunday school, Jean suddenly wheeled around. “Wait, I’ve got to get my stuff!” She came back with her special heart-shaped box and a homemade card. I strapped James Moses in the car seat and took off down the drive. When we got to church, Jean didn’t head straight to her Sunday school classroom. “I’ve got to find Pastor Barry!” she exclaimed. “Where is he?” It wasn’t until then that I bothered to check out Jean’s special box and card.



The card read, “Mrs Hamitlon, I am saveng mony for yuo. I pray for yuo. I love yuo. Jean.” Inside the box was $8.54--every penny the child had saved from her allowance for the past month. The fifty cents she saved by not getting ice cream one day at school. The dollar she got for picking up all her toys and putting them away. The dollar her Meme sent her in the mail. The change from her last big purchase, a Barbie doll.
The dollar and some change she’d been allowed to keep when she helped me clean out the car.



The pure magnitude of the gesture literally took my breath away. This was truly the widow’s mite-every coin the child had in the world, wrapped up in her most special keepsake box, and accompanied with a card decorated with rainbows, a happy sun face, two smiling kitties, and every happy image the child could draw, along with as many words of encouragement as she could get down on paper. This was so much more important than reading or math. Her future? The sky’s the limit.

Reprinted by permission of Connie C. Ellison © 2005 from Chicken Soup for the Soul

Posted by Junie

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She's got it all!

That's a girl with a big heart. God bless her....

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beautiful - a very special child

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Life is a collection of memories to cherish