My Encounters With Stars

There are watershed moments in every human's life that can forever reroute the course of her respective path. For some, it's the day they get married. For others, the day they had their first child was pivotal and changed everything. Still others feel that the loss of a parent or a child changed them forever. Surviving malignant diseases; beating the odds; falling; committing; conquering this or that bad habit; discovering a hidden gift, talent, or passion etc. We all have a story to tell and we can all find an audience for them. Oprah Winfrey, talk show hostess and lifestyle guru broker, calls them, "teachable moments." Sometimes an individual has one. I think for most people there are many in their lifetime.

I remember distinctly in the 6Th grade having a completion ceremony before we moved on to Junior High School. It was at the Beverly Woods Banquet Hall in Chicago. In class, our teacher helped us carefully craft invitations to invite our parents to the celebration, which I discovered recently my mother lovingly saved in a photo album. It was made of orange and green heavy duty construction paper, with cut-outs of plates and bowls, and hand-drawn pictures of cups, knives and forks. It was folded over three times to look like an envelope and was held closed by a piece of clear tape. On the inside was an index card that spelled out, in the neatest printing my 12-year old hand could muster, the important details of the event.

We dressed in our little almost grown dresses for the girls and suits for the boys. Got our hair pressed and curled, or permed, some for the first time. The boys had "fresh" haircuts. See we were preteens; on our way to being full fledged adults. That elusive and self-conscious age before teenagedom where anything that makes you different, or stand out, can bring on tremendous feelings of shame and awkwardness. It was an exciting time, to say the least!

We had a young girl in our class who had become pretty famous. I didn't know her very well, at all. Some of the kids called her snobbish. I think it's safe to say that any 8 or 9 year old with a better paying job than most adults can be viewed as pretty siddity. Well, we found out on the day of the event that she may be coming back for graduation, which, let's face it, made us all feel extra special. You could hear muffled whispers through fresh curls and gloved hands into ears all day, "Will she have a limo? Will there be cameras? I wonder if I'll be able to get an autograph?" The little boys were trying to act unaffected and "cool."

The whole place, including the parents, were in a little bit of a frenzy because this white stretch limo pulled up outside and word spread quickly, "She's here. She's here." I got up and excitedly followed the crowd, but I stood back a little from the doors and waited for the crowd to settle down before I exited the building. I surveyed the crowd for an opening where a less than average height person could get a good look at the star and proceeded to run to get the spot before someone else did and...wham! I ran headfirst into the glass door and almost knocked myself out cold. I stumbled back a couple of steps, sat down on a ledge by the door, and looked around to see who was laughing at me because I just knew that was coming and it was pretty funny. There were literally little white flashes of light, like stars, in front of my eyes. As the stars cleared I realized nobody saw it. Everyone was so focused on "the star" that I could have been face first on the floor unconscious and I don't even think my parents would've known until she started making her way into the building. In fact, where were my parents? I started getting a little angry because I was wondering why they weren't there like all the others making sure I got to see the star.

I reached up and rubbed my head to see if there was blood or a bump. Nothing. I started towards the banquet hall to get back to my table while everyone was still outside waiting for her to exit. As I entered the hall, in a practically empty room, there were my parents who noticed me and waved at me from our table. I was so relieved to see them that I instantly forgot I ran into the door. I approached the table and they asked, "How big is the limo?" I told them I didn't get a good look at it, which was partially true. They smiled at me. My mother was leaning slightly towards my father. She had on her "good" wig because her hair was still falling out from the medication she had to take for the Lupus she had. My dad was leaning back in his chair with his Kangol cap on turned backwards in signature cool style, and one arm around the back of my mother's chair while covering his mouth partially with his other hand so he could smile. He was a little embarrassed at the missing front tooth in his smile in situations like these, so he never let himself full out smile until he got his partial later on in life. For some reason, at that moment, I was so glad they were my parents. They let me follow "the star," come what may. They held anchor until I came back down to earth and asked me excitedly if I had reached it. But, I sensed it was ok that I didn't. They still loved me no matter what.

I discovered later in life, that there was a prediction by doctors after I was born that my mother wasn't even supposed to make it for my 6Th grade graduation. They gave her a 10 year death sentence upon prognosis. I believe, upon reflection, that they had determined together they wanted to teach me, the youngest, to be as independent as possible as quickly as possible, in case of her passing.

My mother lived long enough to see me graduate from Illinois State University with a Bachelor's degree, almost three decades longer than doctors predicted. She passed away three months later, in 1999, from congestive heart failure. I was paralyzed by the sound of the flatline and the approach of a floating nun at St. Francis hospital until my family came and gingerly pulled me up off the floor.

My father lived to see me move out and get my own place. He passed away from lung cancer in 2005 a month after his 65th birthday. He suffered a stroke almost ten years prior. The doctors told him he would never walk again. My father fell out of the bed every day forcing himself to walk. That was the second time in his life doctors told him he wasn't going to walk. The first time was after being beat in the back with a baseball bat by white kids because he was in the wrong neighborhood in Chicago. He proved the doctors wrong both times. He walked up the stadium stairs at the Redbird Arena for my college graduation.

My sister defiantly told a doctor, "Yeah. I know you said I'm gonna die, but I prayed about it and I don't believe you," with more solid assurance and faith than I've ever seen anyone believe anything in my life. Well, unfortunately, in this case, the doctor was right. But, my sister, who had stopped being able to walk, speak well, write, and was confined to a hospice bed and a wheelchair. insisted every Sunday that I, and a few very good friends, come and get her dressed ,to go to the Kingdom Hall, her place of worship. We did this until she passed away quietly in her sleep from a malignant and untreatable neuroblastoma, not even a full year after our father passed.

There have been unspeakable tragedies over the course of human history. Millions of bodies lost at sea, buried, burned, tortured, riddled with illness, from babies to the elderly and everything in between. The Bible calls death mankind's last enemy. But, my everyday encounters and lessons learned from those three stars called family have informed my knowledge that there is a God that cares for us, all of us, omniscient and ever so loving since we are made in his image. Death has anchored me firmly in life and has given me the power to keep attempting to reach for stars because my family members are all sitting at a huge banquet table in a room of my heart waiting for me to come back down, so I can tell them the story of my adventures when I see them again.