When I was a teenager, I occasionally babysat for a couple of girls, Tracy and Kerry Rankin, one carrot top, one white blonde. They had the palest skin I’d ever seen. Mostly I remember their knobby elbows and knees. I couldn’t envision them as adults. We didn’t keep in touch.

A few years ago I got a message from their mother. They were all coming to the Outer Banks for a family reunion. Would I stop by?

When I walked into their rental cottage two gorgeous women, one redhead, one blonde, greeted me with huge, beautiful smiles. My mouth fell open. They were tall and graceful, with glowing skin.

The house rang with the sound of cousins laughing and jumping off bunk beds. Tracy, the redhead, had three children. Kerry had adopted four children from a Russian orphanage—which is the reason for this story.

It’s a tale of dreams dashed, redrawn, and realized.

PostedMarch 7, 2016

AuthorJan DeBlieu

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A few weeks ago, a car accident in our community took the life of a child. An only child. Now his mother, whom I know through church, is mired in the personal hell through which Jeff and I traveled seven years ago.

Within a few days the mother sent word that she wanted to talk with me. I knew why.

PostedFebruary 14, 2016

AuthorJan DeBlieu

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One day in 1973, tired of arguing with people about his beliefs and actions, John Francis stopped speaking. His silence lasted for 17 years.

Francis had already earned a reputation as a bit eccentric by the time he decided that talking didn’t serve his goals. Two years earlier, after the collision of two tankers in San Francisco Bay caused a massive oil spill, he had stopped using all forms of motorized transportation. Occasionally he biked or sailed, but mostly he traveled on foot as a form of environmental protest. He called himself the Planetwalker.

But what was the point, people would ask.

PostedJanuary 20, 2016

AuthorJan DeBlieu

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From a blog I recently published on the Huffington Post:

I have an odd kind of superpower. I can look at people who are suffering and feel immediate empathy for them. I’m not bragging here; it’s true.

It’s because I’ve been through my own brand of hell.

Read more here about the most important lesson I've ever learned: that even the deepest grief can be healed by acts of compassion.

PostedDecember 30, 2015

AuthorJan DeBlieu

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There are quite a few things I could tell you about Dr. Charles Miller, a retired physician in Wilmington, Delaware, who has made dozens of trips abroad to care for the world’s impoverished peoples. But what I want to concentrate on today is Dr. Miller’s ability to adapt easily to changes in plans. This is a skill I’d like to hone, especially during busy times. The holidays, for example.

I met Dr. Miller when my father suggested I speak with him about his experiences in international health care. In 1999, after 30 years as a pediatrician, Dr. Miller settled into what he hoped would be a happy retirement with his beloved wife. He was 70. A year later his wife suffered an internal hemorrhage that left her with a brain injury. Two years later she died.

I don’t want to give the impression that Dr. Miller adapted to this initial change of plans with ease. Quite the opposite. For nine months he lived in what he describes as the deepest sorrow imaginable.

One day he received a magazine in the mail that advertised a “Weekend for Renewal” at the Cove, the retreat center in Asheville, North Carolina, run by Billy Graham. He signed up for it without reading any details.

PostedDecember 8, 2015

AuthorJan DeBlieu

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Rescued

What I've Learned

Silence and Listening

Supercharged Compassion

Change of Plans

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