Life Has A Unique Way Of Coming Full Circle
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Sage Grass – By Betty Crenshaw
I got the most amazing and shocking phone call tonight. Thank you, Amanda Haas for being a bridge to this lady. All my life I have wanted and looked for someone who was my mother’s friend during her school years, to know what she was like and if I looked like her as a teen.
This lady called me tonight that was friends with my mother in school and she wants to meet me. She even has a picture of my mama. Excitement, anxiety, all the above to be able to meet her. And she lives in the same town as me. I was once told I was named after one of my mother’s best friends. Could this be her? Just so much excitement!!!!! God has yet answered another long-asked prayer.
– Betty Kirk’s Facebook post
I am that lady. I made the phone call, and I was just as excited about meeting her. I had not seen her mother, Mary Lee Crocker, since we were in the fifth grade at Jeff Davis School – about 70 years ago! Lots of things can cause you to remember a person; funny things, sad things, or things they said or did. Tragic or funny. I think there was always an affinity between Mary Lee and I. Maybe because our families were among the poorest. At that time everyone was poor; some of us were just a little poorer. As small children we could not have vocalized it, but we felt the stigma of poverty. Even in first grade, I think we both felt its sting.
However, we survived and years passed, but from time to time something would cause me to remember Mary Lee. A quiet grief went through my heart when I heard that she died. Life had been difficult.
At the age of 29 she left five small children. Betty was three days old.
In February of this year, I met Betty’s cousin, Amanda Haas and her aunt, Many Ann Crocker who was married to Mary Lee’s brother Alonzo. I asked about her immediately, “Did she have children? Where are they? I learned that she died three days after giving birth to Betty. I had to meet her.
I wasn’t disappointed. To say that Betty looks like her mother is an understatement, but that is only part of the story. This little girl, without her mother’s love and care had a difficult childhood, but she is a survivor, a fighter and an overcomer.
When Betty was 13 years old, she met a very handsome young man in Vardaman, Mississippi, Drew Kirk. They waited until she was 15 to get married! Mary Lee must have raised her eyebrows at this. That was thirty-five years ago.
So now Betty is happily married. At the age of 18 she got her GED. In her early twenties she went through cosmetology school and worked as a beautician several years. The “big 3-0” comes and again Betty studies, this time for her LPN license. She worked eight years as a LPN and decides it’s time once again to study. She is now a licensed RN! I believe Mary Lee saw each step she took and is very proud of the infant daughter she left behind.
When I knew Mary Lee we were small children, insignificant and poor, but precious to God. Even a little sparrow doesn’t fall to the ground “without the Father.” So we know that Mary Lee, one of His little ones who trusted Him is safe in His arms. And He kept Betty through all the hard times and blessed her life with a loving husband, children and grandchildren. He answered her prayer and caused us to meet. I, too, have been deeply touched. Life has come full circle. Mary Lee rests in peace, and I have met Betty, her amazing daughter. Was she named after me?
Only Mary Lee and God know for sure. I hope so.
