Hello all,
I am afraid I do not get here very often ever since my desktop security program refuses to let me visit, I am reduced to visiting on my wife's iPad which makes me type on this pitiful touch screen.
As we approach the season of Christmas many of our thoughts and actions turn toward benevolent activities especially if you are involved in a church.
Our church is involved in many missional activities at this time of year which involve reaching out to those less fortunate - my wife and I are heavily involved with various missions to help the homeless and nearly homeless - those that are just barely hanging on by their fingernails. As I have said before on this forum, "There but for the grace of God goes our daughter."
I am very happy to report that our daughter, K, is now 32 months clean and sober from Oxy, Opana, heroin and crack. V-e-r-y slowly she is actually becoming an adult at 26, she slowly realizes that she is not really the center of the universe and as someone at least slightly more fortunate than others , she has some responsibilities to fulfill to the world at large. People she has never met and probably never will.
The other night she called just to chat a bit - for quite awhile we almost dreaded hearing from her as it was sure to be some crisis which invariably required infusions of cash into her bank account. On a positive note, hearing her voice during that time meant that she was still alive.
She posed a normal non-commital question , " What are you guys doing?" We told her that this coming Saturday was the annual mass cookie baking for the Chistmas Basket project at church where my volunteer crew bakes about 2000 cookies in a morning for distribution to 100 plus families along with the other ingredients for Christmas dinner plus small gifts for all members of their families. That I had solicited the members of several church committees and the Board of Trustees for money toward the Helping Hands Project that collects gloves for distribution at various homeless shelters and had already received commitments for enough money to purchase almost 400 pairs.
That was the bigger picture, but right at the moment we were wrapping our presents for the Star Tree portion of the Chistmas Basket Project. We had taken 3 stars from the trees - a 2 year old girl, a 14 year old girl and a 47 year old woman. Not so many when you consider there were over 435 stars on the trees.......
K blurted out, " OH MY GOD! I need to find a Star Tree! I gotta' to do something quick, they'll all be gone!" ...........[I]Dad's heart sings![I]..........The conversation continued with us giving her ideas as to non-religious organizations that would be running similar drives and programs.
It does pain us that she is not affiliated with a church - perhaps that will come later in her recovery - if I have learned nothing else in the rooms of Nar-Anon, it is to not push my expectations onto her, it almost never works.
She recently moved to Coral Springs, from Delray Beach, FL, to be closer to her job in Boca Raton, perhaps she will drift into Church by the Glades,
www.cbglades.com , a mega church in Coral Springs; their tag line "No Perfect People Allowed"; welcome from their young minister - " If you are messed up, jacked up, or shacked up - welcome to your new home!" I don't think you can get any more inclusive or non-judgemental than that!
So for right now, I am as proud as can be for and about her - there was a period during which I thought everything we had tried to instill in her growing up had been lost to heroin.
I am not bashful, I will savor the joy from every victory I can!
Keep coming back,
Jim