Heart Hope by Olga

Its funny how certain experiences trigger unexpected emotions. One of those incidents happened today. My daughter texted me – “I’m at the airport and see my old kindergarten teacher from First Pres. What’s her name again?” The feelings of gratitude filled my eyes with tears, remembering how that special lady, Mrs. Clark, had help to mold and change a little girl’s future. Over thirty years ago when Margaret was in kindergarten in Fort Worth, TX I was told by a teacher that my daughter had many learning disabilities and would never be successful in school, would not be able to read and that she should definitely be held back. These words were devastating to me. After all this was my first born child and we thought she was pretty perfect. Only a few weeks after the heartbreaking news we moved from Texas to my hometown of Jackson, MS. Margaret was put into a kindergarten class at First Presbyterian Christian School. A conference was held with her teacher to inform her about what the...

St. Patrick’s Day--On this day in 1904 a baby girl was born that became my beloved great aunt, “Bibby.” Born Anne Elizabeth Heard, she always loved the fact that she got to celebrate her birthday on this Irish holiday, because of her Scotch-Irish heritage. She always wore green and handed out shamrocks on her special day. (By the way—did you know that shamrocks are the symbol of the celebration because St Patrick used the three-leaf clover to explain the Trinity when he was evangelizing Ireland.) Bibby was like an extra grandmother to me. She taught me to sew, including matching plaids, putting in zippers and lining a tailored garment. I even followed in her footsteps and became a Home Economics teacher. She bought me my first sewing machine and we would compare teacher stories even after she had been retired for more than 30 years.  Since she never married, Bibby was not wealthy and didn’t have a lot of material possessions; in fact she always wore the same purple oval ring. Whe...