Redefining life... yet again.

I am blessed to know an incredibly strong and courageous woman. She and I do not share the same religious views, but she is a woman of great faith.

I met this lady when I started working at Liberty. She was the school secretary at the time, and her husband had just won a battle with cancer. Unfortunately, within 6 months, his cancer had returned, bigger and badder than before. They fought a long and hard battle together, but a few months later the cancer got the best of him, and he was called home. Sharon was left with a teen-age son to raise (her oldest son had already left home), and while it wasn't easy, she can now proudly say that he has just finished his first year of college at Alabama.

On April 27th, just after the first tornado moved through the area, Sharon got a call from a neighbor. There was some damage around their community, and as soon as we got out of school she raced home. Several more tornadoes moved through their community that day, and while I am not sure of the exact chain of events, her house was hit, and most of her neighborhood was wiped out. Her house is still standing, but not livable. Her son was still in Tuscaloosa that day, and while there was lots of damage all around him, he was on campus and safe.

In the days since, she has had to find a new place to live, salvage what she could out of her house, and deal with lots of insurance reps. Today she had two huge trees removed from her yard, and the kids and I helped her clear them. She had to board up one of her front windows that was blown out, and this is what it now looks like.


She wanted to put something on the board to make a statement. I think it is a pretty powerful one.

I hope that if I ever have to go through some of the things that she has, I can handle them with as much dignity and grace as she has. She is an inspiration to me, and I am blessed to call her my friend.