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(Click photo to enlarge)
This is what hurricanes do.
On September 13, this street in Gilchrist, Texas was lined with homes and probably some businesses.
One Ike later, one house still stands.
This, to me, is a symbol of what life can do.
The winds begin to blow, the floods and storm surge begin to rise, and once-beautiful lives turn to random sticks and bricks.
I want to be the last house standing.
I want to be the one who can prevail, even if all others fall to the ferocious winds.
I just don’t want to have to face any storms to prove it.
(Image by David J. Phillip/Getty Images. For more Hurricane Ike images, click here)
Neville Davidson
Somewhere, sometime, somebody left a simple, small, cedar cross as an anonymous gift for someone they’d never meet.
Sometime later, on a spiritual retreat, a broken, blind, and deeply depressed man received that cross, and his life was changed. Now mine has been, too, because of how that man chose to rise from the depths of his pain. I’d like to share his story; Neville Davidson is a LifeVestor.
If you see the glass as half-empty, Neville has gotten a raw deal. Born in Warrenton, a small town between Liverpool and Manchester in the UK, his childhood memories are dotted with the sound of German bombs, forced relocation of himself and his siblings for their safety, and unceasing danger during World War II. Later, at age 26, Neville was told his wife had terminal bronchial pneumonia, and would have to move to a warm, dry climate. He considered an offer to move to Australia. But his sister had married an American GI, and moved to Lubbock, Texas. Neville chose family, and literally had to uproot his own household and start his life over in a place where he knew virtually no one. A few years later, his marriage dissolved.
Neville married Jenny, his wife today, in 1971. Just five years later, he developed a disease in one of his eyes, and lost his sight in that eye. In 1984, he completely lost the sight in his other eye. Neville’s world literally and figuratively became completely dark. [click to continue…]
