Having some history behind it which I have never hidden, because, really, my an open book!
Just ask and I could go on for hours...
So. here goes the history behind the photo
Taken sometime within the spring/summer of 1973 at SunnyHill Health Center which is a branch of BC Children's Hospital and where I spent the good part of 6 months as a impatient and 12 years as an out patient.
I had just turned 5, when my world and the world for all those round me was turned upside down.
Back in the day when the Vancouver General Hospital had a children's ward, I was there, spending time, a lot time between the two hospitals.
In describing this photo; well, with me is my mom and my ten year old brother and this was our Sunday afternoon casual time.
Casual time; was the time after church. The time before they got on a city bus and went home, home without me!
Me, the city bus and church, didn't quite work in that order. After all, this was in a day, not too long ago, when handy-buses were not even thought of....so how did we get around...
By the grace of others; especially when we didn't have the availability of a car which just added to challenge!
Challenging is a good word to describe our lives back then, but one thing that kept us going, was His Word especially were it stated; that Our Lord doesn't give us anything greater than that which we can handle!
The vastness of that scripture; a lot goes on in one persons life, but too a reliance on His Word and in His People are key elements.
His people, the church community, I can't imagine, (I could but I don't want to go there) how things would have gone without there support. Sometimes it seems as if everyone has walked away, but in the true trials of life, a true friend in there when you are in your deepest need!
The church; Broadway Church which was called Broadway Tabernacle back in the day, was instrumental in our survival after.....after the traffic accident.....the hit and run...
What some of the neighborhood children enjoyed, was to congregate in one neighbors yard that was set up like a playground. So that's were a number of us would go who lived in the neighboring apartments.
We just lived across the street; a residential street; down from Broadway and up from 2nd Avenue on Alberta Street, when I would make that one mistake that would cost me, my memory and the use of my right hand...
My mom was a witness to it all, as she would look out our third floor window to the children and the carnage below. It only takes a second of time, but in that second, a second when my mom had turned her back, she heard the screeching tired of a car rounding the corner.
To her shock and horror, she turned around at the moment when my lifeless body was hurtling through the air; coming to rest a half a a city block later in a gravel filled ditch!
A fist sized lump above my left eye and gravel imbedded in my head, severe head trauma, and a journey that hasn't stopped to this day...
The journey home and to church.......when back at Sunnyhill Health Center, when I was aloud home on weekends...my grandmother would drive us home, but to church....
The Sunday school bus was there; men to carry me on and off while spending the rest of my time in a wheelchair......something, only God knew I'd one day be rid of...but the temporary it was a struggle getting me to and from; up and down....
Such things get me wondering; when my daughter Emily is at an age that she is out the nursery; hopefully like the other children at 3 years, what will happen when the other children go down stairs for their program; what will happen with Emily.
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