“Tell me facts, and I’ll learn. Tell me truth, and I’ll believe you. But tell me a story and it will live in my heart forever.” – Native American Proverb

Miss O came home from the second week of middle school with a story she was carrying. She said that there’s a 6^th grade boy with ADHD. He’s short with short hair and wears purple glasses. She felt bad for him because her friends said that a teacher in a class stood behind him doing the hand motion for a chatterbox. You know – the talking with your hand kind of motion.

But then this kid got up to do karaoke at lunch. Apparently, they do karaoke on Fridays every week at her middle school. He picked a song and totally rocked it. He just gave it all he had and did great. She started crying as she told me this part because she was so impressed that someone could live out in the open like that, especially as a new-to-middle school 6th grader.

And I told her a story I was carrying. I was out walking Cooper the other day and from a block away saw my neighbor, Ken, out weeding. He lives one block west and one block south of us so not a close connection. But I have spent enough time walking with my dogs and children in the 26 years I’ve lived here that I’ve gotten to know these neighbors.

I watched as their kids left home. Then when they subdivided their lot and built a small house in the yard so their daughter and her husband could live in the house she grew up in. And then the daughter had two babies. We gave them our playhouse and our pink plastic “Fred Flintstone” car. So we’re close enough to be touched by each other but not in each other’s lives.

When I saw Ken, I wondered for a moment if I wanted to walk a different way. Not because I don’t like him, but because I knew in my gut something was wrong. The other day he was weeding his driveway and he didn’t look up. I haven’t seen his wife in a few weeks.

I chose to stay the course and used the block to just open my heart to hold whatever was coming. When I approached, Cooper leaned into him. As Ken threaded his fingers through Coopers fur, he quietly said, “I don’t know if you know but Marilyn passed away in June. She had pancreatic cancer.”

Oh dang. I remarked that she was young. Ken said she was 2 days younger than him – 75 years old. When I asked, he told me they’d been married for 48 years.

Both Miss O and I were crying by the time I finished telling the story. Two stories of the quiet struggle and courage of people living out loud. So many different ways to be courageous. The common denominator is that for all those that are watching, there’s not a dry eye in the house.

(featured photo is from Pexels)

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