Once upon a time a little 9 year old girl folded her heart full of hope into a tiny piece of paper with her name written on it, to go into a draw for the most desired prize she’d ever heard of. With every fold, her heart was pleading ‘please, please’ to be one of two from the class able to travel with the relief teacher to visit their much adored year 3 teacher at the hospital with her brand new baby.
The teacher they had for the balance of the year was terror with lipstick on to me. As polar opposite the adored new mum teacher as could possibly be.
Of course – my – teeny piece of paper was lost in the box of hopefuls, and some much cleverer people at the art of raffle draws had giant pieces of paper which were found and drawn much more easily than the tiny scrap of huge hope I put through the slot on the box. I always felt so silly for not having been smarter about it… I was sad for weeks.
Fast forward to today.
A brand new friend of just one term had a picture up from Mothers Day and something about the older woman yanked me back to read more carefully… and there was her name… Mrs Franklin… I literally gasped and wrote my new friend – is that the Mrs Franklin who taught grade 3 at Darlington Primary – and are you that baby? And the answers were YES and YES!!!
My 9 year old heart – leapt inside JUST as it would have that day in the demountable classroom with the wooden top desks that smelled like sharpened pencils and children.
My tiny scrap of hope was seen and heard all along.
To have seen that beautiful woman, and now know her daughter… what a delight. 🙂
And to know my little girls heart was heard? – delight with 43 years of unexpected bonus interest.
I simply love, love, love this!
Our God is an AWESOME God!
His attention to our minutiae takes my breath away!