The Freedom to...

If you'd like, check out this video on Official LDS Site. I have a link to that site down on the sidebar called "Roving the Internet". I liked the video a lot.

Make A Wish

I don't know about his wish here, but mine has come true. Art did very well with hip surgery. Yesterday he used a walker to move down the halls of St. Marks hospital. All has gone well, so today he will be going to rehab at Health South. (Our third choice of places, but oh, well. It's close to home and the other two choices had no rooms available.) The kids have all been great to provide transportation for me. And yesterday (Surprise!) I was given permission to get rid of the splint! Ta-da!!!

(Stephanie's feelings at the moment of winning Bingo pretty much express how I feel about it!)

I am actually typing with two hands this morning. It is a bit awkward as now the tendons in the other fingers have shortened by being immobilized for so long. So now it's on to more physical therapy (ouch!) to stretch them out. The thumb is still healing on the inside although the incision is totally healed at this point. As soon as I have a good left hand grip, I have permission to drive. Freedom! The picture at the top is a birthday photo from 2006! In 2008 I will be in the hospital for his August birthday and it will be two days after my surgery on his special day. He has been a good model for me. He's been patient, has had very little pain, is following instructions so his progress has been steady. I suspect it won't be long before he will be home. We're so blessed.

Pondering Freedom

This past week I have been indexing records of slave owners in the US in the 1800's. The work has gone relatively quickly this time. The handwriting is somewhat more easy to read than most and the facts are brief. But I have felt sad as I have typed these records for submission. I guess what made me most sorrowful as I read was the fact that the slaves themselves are not listed by name. It was as if they were things, not people. The form required the name of the slave owner, then one by one, each slave he owned was listed by age, sex and race. One particularly touching entry sent my imagination into a story line. This particular man had a female slave, age 27 who had three children, the oldest 13. So she was 14 when that child was born. There is no male slave listed who was of an age to be her husband. On the line for race for the children, there was the letter M. I believe that stood for mulatto. My dictionary says the definition of the word is "the first generation offspring of a Negro and a white person." So I am left to my own thoughts and imaginings as to the truth behind the statistics. This is real history at my fingertips.
I finish the record hoping that somehow the descendants of these people are able to trace them. I can see that it will take miracles for this to happen. And now I understand, more than ever, what a tragic time this was in the history of my country.
There are many ways to be a slave. I am grateful that I am not involved with the slavery of those times. Yet I know for myself that it is an awesome responsibility to have moral agency. And it is not easy. Today I am recognizing that I too am a slave to my own unwise choices when I am not careful (and prayerful). It takes a lot of effort to resist those things which drag me down. I hope I can remember the wonderful feeling it is to be truly free.