REASON FOR CRYING

I saw Justin the bat flying tight circles in the park sky and recalled several incidents when my daughter was little, May I share them with you?

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When my friend Beverly rushed into the room to see what was the matter, her daughter Sarah was trying to console the crying little girl a year younger than herself.

"Don't cry. He was only teasing." The older brother stood nearby, obviously consternated. Sarah quickly spoke in his defense. "Mom, he didn't mean anything. He does this all the time."

Beverly shot a look at Daniel. "What? You make little girls cry all the time?

What had happened was Daniel was teasing SARAH, his SISTER! My daughter Emi, who sat on the sofa, couldn't stand seeing her friend get picked on, and had begun to cry! That startled him so much, he HAD to quit!

Sarah and Emi were bosom buddies. Sarah taught her everything: how to ride the swing, how to fall down the stairs (before she knew how to walk down them). And I think it was from Sarah she learned a tender heart too--the reason Emi cried when she thought her friend was getting hurt was her heart echoed the time Sarah cried:

It was when she discovered the lifeless form of a bat. Most little girls would be screaming at the sight of a rat, but Sarah shed tears for "the poor little thing."

Adults might look at these two girls and conclude they were just immature.

I wonder if their tears show their hearts were still tender, and they hadn't lost the ability to express love?

WILL JUSTIN ENVY SHEPHERDS？

"Then you will think about guys like us, right?", Justin the bat seemed to ask. I didn't have an answer.

The popular Christmas story teaches that the God of Heaven was willing to stoop to the lowest rungs of humanity, came to the shepherds. The majority of humans then turn up noses at bats, spiders, snakes, insects, and slugs.

I wonder what kind of relationship the Son of man would've had with these creatures?

MY FAVORITE MEDALIST

Just before my sister moved down to Okinawa almost 10 years ago, a huge, flat carton arrived at the front door--she had won a color TV! One of those things you KNOW you will never, ever in a million years win, right? She hadn't even bothered to open it then, just let it be sent that way. The TV was set up on a small table in her basement apartment. Well, it made the table look small.

Altho' for a few weeks, I didn't get to see my critter friends at the park, I got to see animals in their natural habitats anyway, via nature TV shows that flashed across that large screen. That's a bat flying over the surface of the water!

Oh--hanging around the edge of the monitor frame are Joyce's graduation tassel on the right side and the longer thing on the left is the blue ribbon at the end of which is the medal for winning the voice contest. And the Clione plankton, monkey, and turtles on rock down the side of the picture are souvenir magnets nearby.

After my stepmother's funeral, I saw my sister running around to the banks, city office, post office, etc., taking care of legal matters concerning the accounts, bills, house, property, inheritance. Many great leaders would be willing to make "brave sacrifices" necessary to stand at the front of a large army. But I wonder how many would spend hours in the dark reminding elderly parents to take their medicine (repeatedly because they forget if you tell them just once) or would humble themselves to work in languages they had to constantly ask for help? I'm sure Joyce felt a lot better being handed a medal for first place than being given repeated explanations by the clerk.

Daddy had several small handwritten memos in his study: "No holiness without humility." Qualities of humility, meekness, integrity have been so forgotten, even in the contemporary Church. But I think I saw one medalist that, at least unconsciously, hadn't forgotten.