Well, today is new years day and the day that I have designated to begin a new chapter. I my life were a series of books, there are volumes from the Christopher days, ending, of course with the accident. That volume has not been finished as the legal process continues on. That ending, however, has no impact on the beginning of my new chapter.
Actually, the Christopher days did not end on December 8, 2007 because he will always be a part of my life and a huge part of who I am. As I am facing various decisions that will always include the thought of what Christopher would say. I even think of this as I move into this new chapter. no matter what choices I make down the road, the reality will always be that my options are different “because Christopher died.” But my goal here is to try to look forward, not ignoring the past, but focusing on the future, where ultimately, I’ll be reunited with my son.
In January, I will be applying for the PhD program in Social Work at Florida State. Effective January 9, I will be working just part-time while I take the last of my coursework to complete my Masters in Social Work. In May, I am going to take a leave of absence from my job so that I can do my final internship on a full-time basis. The plan currently is that I will do my internship working in a private practice that I have benefited from as they do a lot of work with foster and adopted children. I am very excited for this opportunity. Hopefully, this will all be finalized early in the Spring semester.
With the extra time in Spring (I’ve been working fully time, taking two classes so I figure that working part-time and just taking two classes, I should have some extra time), I have two goals. First of all, I hope to commit some time a week to de-cluttering my house. As many know, that is a lofty goal. Secondly, my plan is to take time in the community that Door of Hope is called to serve. My goal is simple; I want to begin to build relationships in an effort to understand better the needs of the community.
That is what really motivates me right now. My passion has always been for the rights of children. I think that too often, they are in situations void of hope. One of the tenants of the Social Work profession is an individual’s right to self-determination. I think what I have seen is that in order to care for the children, we must work with the parents. I am confident that parents love their children, but I am not sure that they realize the impact their choices have on the options available to their children.
This is not about evangelism or converting these people, it is about our call to love widows and orphans and meet the needs of the poor. I can remember growing up in the Catholic church we often sang the song, “Whatsoever you do to the least of my brothers, that you do unto me.” I am simply trying to find out how best to do this.
To this end, I am considering a foundation to attract funding to serve children. The name would be Children Deserve Hope (CDH, in honor of Christopher). I have already registered the domain name of bighef.org (again, in honor of Christopher). My goal is to be able to provide training/opportunities for parents and their young children in order to preserve the hope that I believe is innate in all of us until we are robbed as a consequence of life experiences.
Children do deserve hope and I personally believe that there are sufficient resources in a community like Tallahassee. My goal is to find the resources to meet the needs identified by the community itself.