Strength

A victory at the race in December 2010 would guarantee 16-year-old Holland Reynolds' California track team a state championship. But just feet from the finish line, Reynolds collapses. A race official, who runs immediately to her side, explains to her that if she wants to finish the race, she can perhaps crawl enough to get one foot over the line--but if she gets assistance from anyone, she would have to be disqualified. Stunning the crowd, Reynolds pulls herself up and crawls toward the finish. In a dramatic, inspiring end, Reynolds crosses the finish line on hands and knees and crosses fast enough to secure the state championship for her team. "I just wanted to cross the line," Reynolds explained to ABC News.

-- By Emily Alford Park, R.N.

Dedicated to all who "wear white."

Do you know what it feels like to enter the room of a child who is delirious with fever... crying out in moans... reaching out in the darkness for some comfort from the frightening world of sickness. I DO.

Do you know what it feels like to stand in the hallway of a busy Emergency Room and watch the Rescue Workers racing frantically towards you as they bring in the victims of the automobile wreckage just five blocks away. I DO.

By Ina Hughs

We pray for children
who put chocolate fingers everywhere,
who like to be tickled,
who stomp in puddles and ruin their new pants,
who sneak Popsicles before supper,
who erase holes in math workbooks,
who can never find their shoes.

And we pray for those
who stare at photographers from behind barbed wire,
who’ve never squeaked across the floor in new sneakers,
who never “counted potatoes,”
who are born in places we wouldn't be caught dead,

-- by David L. Kuzminski

-- by  Bill Walls
My friend John always has something to tell me. He knows so much that young men have to have older and more worldly wise men to tell them. For instance who to trust, how to care for others, and how to live life to the fullest. ÔÇ¿ÔÇ¿

Recently, John lost his wife Janet. For eight years she fought against cancer, but in the end her sickness had the last word. ÔÇ¿ÔÇ¿

 -- Author unknown

Do you know the legend of the Cherokee Indian youth's rite of Passage?

His father takes him into the forest, blindfolds him and leaves him alone.

He is required to sit on a stump the whole night and not remove the blindfold until the rays of the morning sun shine through it.

He cannot cry out for help to anyone.

Once he survives the night, he is a MAN.
He cannot tell the other boys of this experience, because each lad must come into manhood on his own.

-- Author Unknown

Michael is the kind of guy you love to hate. He is always in a good mood and always has something positive to say. When someone would ask him how he was doing, he would reply, "If I were any better, I would be twins!" He was a natural motivator. If an employee was having a bad day, Michael was there telling the employee how to look on the positive side of the situation.

By Sonny Carroll

There comes a time in your life when you finally get it... When in the midst of all your fears and insanity you stop dead in your tracks and somewhere the voice inside your head cries out- ENOUGH!  Enough fighting and crying or struggling to hold on.   And, like a child quieting down after a blind tantrum, your sobs begin to subside, you shudder once or twice, you blink back your tears and through a mantle of wet lashes you begin to look at the world from a new perspective. This is your awakening.
 

A True Story -- Taken from a speech made by Capt. John S. McCain, USN, (Ret) who represents Arizona in the U.S. Senate.

A True Story and Photo -- Author Unknown