60th Anniversary...

Yesterday, I attended a very special event honoring my mother, who 60 years ago, was an integral part of starting a School for Little Children - a preschool - at our church. This school has since become nationally respected for its pioneering work with young children and their families.

My mother looked forward to the event for weeks, but also had her apprehensions because she felt odd being singled out as so important. However, I know that it is one of the three things she has done in her 96 years of which she is most proud.

Now, I know I'm giving away valuable information, but I'm not even old enough to have celebrated the 60th anniversary of anything in my life, but encouraging her through this event set my reflective cogs in motion. (It doesn't take much, so this was a biggie!) The question: What have I done in my lifetime that might be as meaningful - what would be my Top Three? Tough question. I couldn't come up with anything as lasting as starting a preschool in a time when that was a very forward-thinking thing to do.

Besides managing to raise my three children without their loving father alongside - which was the goal to which I had to apply myself fully for so long, I could only think of small things that I could hope were especially meaningful to people I touched in my lifetime. Singing for a young patient at M.D. Anderson whose family requested that I visit his room because he was too weak to get out of bed; teaching music theory to a mischievous teenager at HSPVA who went on to set up a successful business in L.A.; playing in an orchestra for a touring opera company that took full-production opera to people in arts-hungry small towns like Eagle Pass, Texas and Sedona, Arizona - towns where they watched opera from bleachers in the basketball gym, or drove down the mountain in the snow to attend, not knowing whether they would be able to get home after the performance.

I don't know what the future holds as far as illuminating other chances to make a difference. I'm not sure that it really has to matter that much. But I can keep looking for opportunities!