This is my first post to the Jesusla Foundation. My life with Bernadine has blessed me in countless ways, but I would like to share a singular insight that I could not have acquired in any other way.
During our engagement, Bernadine had told me of her humanitarian work in the Haitian Orphanages in 2002. That was her first encounter, almost a reunion, with Jesusla. Without first-hand experience, I'm not certain anyone could possibly comprehend how demoralizing the orphanages were. The sheer numbers of infants overwhelmed the workers and volunteers. The sights, the smells, the sounds of crying and sobbing infants would devastate anyone. Hundreds of sick and ill infants, some lying in pools of diarrhea, all hungering for human touch and affection.
Bernadine described long days holding, comforting, cuddling hundreds of babies, with hundreds of diaper changes. After a harrowing day, she and her 14-year-old son, David, would retire to the storage room they shared with a huge spider. After David fell asleep, she would pray and cry herself to sleep. She felt utterly hopeless. All her efforts were futile. She had accomplished nothing except to instill within those children a sense of "false hope." That false hope would ultimately be betrayed, and the children would be left with a worse sense of deprivation and abandonment.
After 6 years, those memories still haunted.
To celebrate our Wedding in 2007, we took a December Honeymoon trip to New York. We did all of the touristy fun things. We had attended a late Broadway play and were returning by cab to our hotel. It was snowing, traffic was murder, and the ride was endless. Our Cab driver was a Haitian; he had managed to move to New York and start a family. He was gracious, kind, and good-natured about the adverse conditions. Because Bernadine's experiences had provided me some insight into his background,I had already made a mental note to tip this Gentleman well.
In the course of our chatting, Bernadine volunteered her Haitian Orphanage experience. She admitted that some nights, after the lights were out, she would pray that a Tsunami would just erase Port Au Prince, and end the endless suffering. She voiced her deep sense of failure in not being able to permanently alleviate, or alter the future of those infants to the slightest degree. She had abandoned them, leaving behind the worst possible bequest, "a sense of false hope."
Our driver listened quietly and thoughtfully. Finally he spoke, "No. No, you did not fail. What you gave those children was HOPE." The only deceit lay in our interpretation of failure.
He went on to emphatically state that, Bernadine had provided those children a priceless gift: The optimism that, at any time, they could treasure and realize the dream of something better.
By the tiniest shift in perspective from "false hope" to hope, Bernadine had created a miracle in those children's lives. She had left them with a permanent, priceless gift. Hope. What this brilliant, kind man had done was to give us, in turn, a priceless Christmas gift. The true meaning of Hope. The Creator's understanding of Hope.
Daily, I consciously try to cherish this lesson within me. It has hopefully stayed. By the subtlest shift in our perspective, in the most desperate of circumstances, we can often uncover a priceless treasure. True Hope is one of the greatest gifts we can offer to those around us. It is a pearl without price.
As an after note, the Gentleman refused the fare and the tip. That late winter night encounter with a Haitian Prince was another priceless gift. It was a choice privilege of witnessing true nobility of soul. An Angel. That is another story.
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