Chicken Soup for the Soul 20th Anniversary Edition (42 page)

Trouble and perplexity drive me to prayer and prayer drives away perplexity and trouble.

~Philip Melanchthen

W
e’re a rugged breed, us quads. If we weren’t, we wouldn’t be around today. Yes, we’re a rugged breed. In many ways, we’ve been blessed with a savvy and spirit that isn’t given to everybody.

And let me say that this refusal of total or full acceptance of one’s disability all hooks up with one thing — faith, an almost divine faith.

Down in the reception room of the Institute of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, over on the East River at 400 East 34th Street in New York City, there’s a bronze plaque that’s riveted to the wall. During the months of coming back to the Institute for treatment — two or three times a week — I rolled through that reception room many times, coming and going. But I never quite made the time to pull over to one side and read the words on that plaque that were written, it’s said, by an unknown Confederate soldier. Then one afternoon, I did. I read it and then I read it again. When I finished it for the second time, I was near to bursting — not in despair, but with an inner glow that had me straining to grip the arms of my wheelchair. I’d like to share it with you.

A Creed For Those Who Have Suffered

I asked God for strength, that I might achieve.

I was made weak, that I might learn humbly to obey...

I asked for health, that I might do great things.

I was given infirmity, that I might do better things...

I asked for riches, that I might be happy.

I was given poverty, that I might be wise...

I asked for power, that I might have the praise of men.

I was given weakness, that I might feel the need of God...

I asked for all things, that I might enjoy life.

I was given life, that I might enjoy all things...

I got nothing I asked for — but everything I had hoped for. Almost despite myself, my unspoken prayers were answered.

I am, among men, most richly blessed!

~Roy Campanella

Every day you either see a scar or courage. Where you dwell will define your struggle.

~Dodinsky

M
rs. Betty Tisdale is a world-class heroine. When the war in Vietnam heated up back in April of 1975, she knew she had to save the 400 orphans who were about to be put on the streets. She had already adopted five orphaned Vietnamese girls with her former pediatrician husband, Col. Patrick Tisdale, who was a widower and already had five children.

As a U.S. Naval doctor in Vietnam in 1954, Tom Dooley had helped refugees flee from the communist north. Betty says, “I really feel Tom Dooley was a saint. His influence changed my life forever.” Because of Dooley’s book, she took her life savings and traveled to Vietnam 14 times on her vacations to visit and work in the hospitals and orphanages he had founded. While in Saigon, she fell in love with the orphans at An Lac (Happy Place), run by Madame Vu Thi Ngai, who was later evacuated by Betty the day Vietnam fell, and returned with her to Georgia to live with Betty and her ten children.

When Betty, a do-it-now and invent-solutions-as-problems-arise kind of person, realized the 400 children’s plight, she went into warp-speed action. She called Madame Ngai and said, “Yes! I’ll come and get the children and get them all adopted.” She didn’t know how she would do it. She just knew that she’d do it. Later, in a movie of the evacuation, “The Children of An Lac,” Shirley Jones portrayed Betty.

In moments she began to move mountains. She raised the necessary money in many different ways, even including accepting green stamps. She simply decided to do it and she did it. She said, “I visualized all those babies growing up in good homes in America, not under communism.” That kept her motivated.

She left for Vietnam from Fort Benning, Georgia, on Sunday, arrived on Tuesday in Saigon, and miraculously and sleeplessly conquered every obstacle to airlift 400 children out of Saigon by Saturday morning. However, upon her arrival, the head of Vietnam’s social welfare, Dr. Dan, suddenly announced he would only approve children under ten years old and all the children must have birth certificates. She quickly discovered war orphans are fortunate to simply be alive. They don’t have birth certificates.

Betty went to the hospital pediatric department, obtained 225 birth certificates, and quickly created birth dates, times and places for the 219 eligible babies, toddlers and youngsters. She says, “I have no idea when, where and to whom they were born. My fingers just created birth certificates.” Birth certificates were the only hope they had to depart the place safely and have a viable future with freedom. It was now or never.

Now she needed a place to house the orphans once they were evacuated. The military at Fort Benning resisted, but Betty brilliantly and tenaciously persisted. Try as she might, she could not get the Commanding General on the phone, so she called the office of the Secretary of the Army, Bo Callaway. His duty, too, was not answering Betty’s calls, no matter how urgent and of life-saving importance they were.

However, Betty was not to be beaten. She had come too far and done too much to be stopped now. So since he was from Georgia, she called his mother and pleaded her case. Betty enrolled her with her heart and asked her to intercede. Virtually overnight, the Secretary of the Army, her son, responded and arranged that a school at Fort Benning be used as the interim home for the orphans of An Lac.

But the challenge of how to get the children out was still to be accomplished. When Betty arrived in Saigon, she went to Ambassador Graham Martin immediately and pleaded for some sort of transportation for the children. She had tried to charter a Pan Am plane, but Lloyd’s of London had raised the insurance so high that it was impossible to negotiate at this time. The Ambassador agreed to help if all the papers were cleared through the Vietnamese government. Dr. Dan signed the last manifest, literally, as the children were boarding the two Air Force planes.

The orphans were malnourished and sickly. Most had never been away from the orphanage. They were scared. She had recruited soldiers and the ABC crew to help strap them in, transport them and feed them. You can’t believe how deeply and permanently those volunteers’ hearts were touched that beautiful Saturday as 219 children were transported to freedom. All the volunteers cried with joy and appreciation that they had tangibly contributed to another’s freedom.

Chartering airlines home from the Philippines was a huge hassle. There was a $21,000 expense for a United Airlines plane. Dr. Tisdale guaranteed payment because of his love for the orphans. Had Betty had more time, she could have probably got it for free! But time was a factor so she moved quickly.

Every child was adopted within one month of arriving in the United States. The Tressler Lutheran Agency in York, Pennsylvania, which specializes in getting handicapped children adopted, found a home for each orphan.

Betty has proven over and over again that you can do anything at all if you are simply willing to ask, to not settle for a “no,” to do whatever it takes and to persevere.

As Dr. Tom Dooley once said, “It takes ordinary people to do extraordinary things.”

~Jack Canfield and Mark Victor Hansen

Hope is faith holding out its hand in the dark.

~George Iles

I
n 1989 an 8.2 earthquake almost flattened Armenia, killing over 30,000 people in less than four minutes.

In the midst of utter devastation and chaos, a father left his wife securely at home and rushed to the school where his son was supposed to be, only to discover that the building was as flat as a pancake.

After the initial shock, he remembered the promise he had made to his son: “No matter what, I’ll always be there for you!” And tears began to fill his eyes. As he looked at the pile of debris that once was the school, it looked hopeless, but he kept remembering his commitment to his son.

He began to concentrate on where he walked his son to class at school each morning. Remembering his son’s classroom would be in the back right corner of the building, he rushed there and started digging through the rubble.

As he was digging, other forlorn parents arrived, clutching their hearts, saying: “My son!” “My daughter!” Other well-meaning parents tried to pull him off what was left of the school saying:

“It’s too late!”

“They’re dead!”

“You can’t help!”

“Go home!”

“Come on, face reality, there’s nothing you can do!” “You’re just going to make things worse!”

To each parent he responded with one line: “Are you going to help me now?” And then he proceeded to dig for his son, stone by stone.

The fire chief showed up and tried to pull him off the school’s debris, saying “Fires are breaking out, explosions are happening everywhere. You’re in danger. We’ll take care of it. Go home.”

To which this loving, caring father responded, “Are you going to help me now?”

The police came and said, “You’re angry, distraught and it’s over. You’re endangering others. Go home. We’ll handle it!”

To which he replied, “Are you going to help me now?” No one helped.

Courageously he proceeded alone because he needed to know for himself: “Is my boy alive or is he dead?”

He dug for eight hours... 12 hours... 24 hours... 36 hours... then, in the 38th hour, he pulled back a boulder and heard his son’s voice. He screamed his son’s name,
“ARMAND!”

He heard back, “Dad! It’s me, Dad! I told the other kids not to worry. I told them that if you were alive, you’d save me and when you saved me, they’d be saved. You promised, ‘No matter what, I’ll always be there for you!’ You did it, Dad!”

“What’s going on in there? How is it?” the father asked.

“There are 14 of us left out of 33, Dad. We’re scared, hungry, thirsty and thankful you’re here. When the building collapsed, it made a wedge, like a triangle, and it saved us.”

“Come on out, boy!”

“No, Dad! Let the other kids out first, because I know you’ll get me! No matter what, I know you’ll be there for me!”