Reminiscing

Dear Prayer Warriors,

I am still doing very well. We've had a wonderful weekend topped off with a wonderful visit from Randy's parents. Our freezer is about to bust with food (thank you Nana & Mamaw) and we have surpassed the $200 mark in donations for the shirts now. I have also heard this weekend from Isabelle (the little girl at St. Jude's) mom. She sent me an email asking how I was doing. I was blessed by the kindness and thoughtfulness of it.

Today I am reminiscing a little bit. Ever since my diagnosis I have begun to look at things in the past more and more as Godincidences. I believe God puts certain people into our lives for a reason. Some are meant to teach us about life and love. Others are meant to teach us patience and help us grow. I remember at a Pep Moms meeting last year our speaker Marla Delong called some of these people "sandpaper people" because they rub us wrong sometimes, but they smooth out our own character flaws. And then of course God gave us the ultimate example of His own love for us when He designed marriage. Today I'd like to share two stories of how I believe Randy's and my being together is no accident.

When I was in college the beginning of my Sophmore year there was a one time meeting of an academic organization called Alpha Lamda Delta Phi Eta Sigma. I saw Randy for the first time at that meeting. He was sitting two rows over from me. I remembered saying to myself "He looks nice. He looks like the kind of guy who might ask me out." It was a rather strange thought at the time because I had never been asked out on a date by anyone. It was one of those fleeting impressions you get of someone when you pass them by except that it stuck with me.

Now flash forward two years to my Senior year. Let me preface the rest of the story by saying that many of you already know that we three Booth girls "can't get away with anything." It has been a running family joke for years. We all have our own examples of this but mine happened to take place when I was dating Randy. I was also dating one other guy at the time named Doug. I had been upfront with both of them about it but it still came back to haunt me.

One night Doug and I went to a see a movie. I remember quite well it was Jurassic Park. Randy was in ROTC at the time. Well guess who we ended up sitting beside during the movie. You guessed it. Half the ROTC department (including a bunch of Randy's military buddies). Once the movie ended they heckled us out the movie theater all the way through the parking lot. My date's car was in the shop and I drove. I still remember them driving by us honking and laughing. I was so embarrassed.

A few months later Randy was stationed at Fort Knox, KY. One weekend I was at my parent's house and the doorbell rang. Doug was on the doorstep holding a bunch of flowers. Only they weren't from him. Randy had decided to send me flowers and called FTD, one of those national flower numbers. Doug's parents owned a flower shop in Strawberry Plains, about 40 minutes away on the other side of Knoxville. Even though there were about 50 flower shops closer to my parent's house, FTD chose that one to deliver the flowers. Randy had no idea, but the odds you see were in his favor all along.

Isn't that amazing! If any of you have any similar stories of how God has put someone in your life in an amazing way, I would love for you to share them on the blog. Please continue to pray for Isabelle and her family as well. Lots of love,

Kerry