Stories Of Hope & Inspiration

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Blessings from giving

Three young men were once given three kernels of corn apiece by a wise old sage, who admonished them to go out into the world, and use the corn to bring themselves good fortune.

The first young man put his three kernels of corn into a bowl of hot broth and ate them.

The second thought, I can do better than that, and he planted his three kernels of corn. Within a few months, he had three stalks of corn. He took the ears of corn from the stalks, boiled them, and had enough corn for three meals.

The third man said to himself, I can do better than that! He also planted his three kernels of corn, but when his three stalks of corn produced, he stripped one of the stalks and replanted all of the seeds in it, gave the second stalk of corn to a sweet maiden, and ate the third.

His one full stalk’s worth of replanted corn kernels gave him 200 stalks of corn! And the kernels of these he continued to replant, setting aside only a bare minimum to eat. He eventually planted a hundred acres of corn.With his fortune, he not only won the hand of the sweet maiden but purchased the land owned by the sweet maiden’s father. And he never hungered again.

"The generous prosper and are satisfied; those who refresh others will themselves be refreshed." – Proverbs 11:24-25

 

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Precious Lord: Birth of a song

Back in 1932, I was 32 years old and a fairly new husband. My wife, Nettie and I were living in a little apartment on Chicago's Southside. One hot August afternoon I had to go to St. Louis, where I was to be the featured soloist at a large revival meeting. I didn't want to go. Nettie was in the last month of pregnancy with our first child. But a lot of people were expecting me in St. Louis. I kissed Nettie good-bye, clattered downstairs to our Model A and, in a fresh Lake Michigan breeze, chugged out of Chicago on Route 66.

However, outside the city, I discovered that in my anxiety at leaving, had forgotten my music case.

I wheeled around and headed back. I found Nettie sleeping peacefully. I hesitated by her bed; something was strongly telling me to stay. But eager to get on my way, and not wanting to disturb Nettie, I shrugged off the feeling and quietly slipped out of the room with my music.

The next night, in the steaming St. Louis heat, the crowd called on me to sing again and again. When I finally sat down, a messenger boy ran up with a Western Union telegram. I ripped open the envelope. Pasted on the yellow sheet were the words: YOUR WIFE JUST DIED. People were happily singing and clapping around me, but I could hardly keep from crying out. I rushed to a phone and called home.

All I could hear on the other end was "Nettie is dead. Nettie is dead."

When I got back, I learned that Nettie had given birth to a boy. I swung between grief and joy. Yet that night, the baby died. I buried Nettie and our little boy together, in the same casket. Then I fell apart. For days I closeted myself. I felt that God had done me an injustice. I didn't want to serve Him any more or write gospel songs. I just wanted to go back to that jazz world I once knew so well.

But then, as I hunched alone in that dark apartment those first sad days, I thought back to the afternoon I went to St. Louis. Something kept telling me to stay with Nettie. Was that something God? Oh, if I had paid more attention to Him that day, I would have stayed and been with Nettie when she died. From that moment on I vowed to listen more closely to Him.

But still I was lost in grief.

Everyone was kind to me, especially a friend, Professor Frye, who seemed to know what I needed. On the following Saturday evening he took me up to Madam Malone's Poro College, a neighborhood music school. It was quiet; the late evening sun crept through the curtained windows. I sat down at the piano, and my hands began to browse over the keys.

Something happened to me then I felt at peace. I feel as though I could reach out and touch God. I found myself playing a melody, one I'd never heard or played before, and the words into my head-they just seemed to fall into place:

"Precious Lord, take my hand,
lead me on, let me stand!
I am tired, I am weak,
I am worn, Through the storm,
through the night lead me on to the light,
Take my hand, precious Lord, Lead me home."

The Lord gave me these words and melody. He also healed my spirit. I learned that when we are in our deepest grief, when we feel farthest from God, this is when He is closest, and when we are most open to His restoring power. And so I go on living for God willingly and joyfully, until that day comes when He will take me and gently lead me home.

-Thomas A. Dorsey- Gospel Songwriter

 

[FineLinen]

Dear friends: Know this, the Father of all fathers loves you. No matter what your struggle is, He holds you.

 

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Angels in the alley

Diane, a young Christian University student, was home for the summer. She had gone to visit some friends one evening and time passed quickly as each shared their various experiences of the past year.

She ended up staying longer than planned, and had to walk home alone. She wasn't afraid, because it was a small town and she lived only a few blocks away.

As she walked along under the tall elm trees, Diane asked "God" to keep her safe from harm and danger. When she reached the alley, which was a short cut to her house, she decided to take it, however, halfway down the alley she noticed a man standing at the end as though he were waiting for her. She became uneasy and began to pray, asking for "God's" protection. Instantly a comforting feeling of quietness and security wrapped around her, she felt as though someone was walking with her.

When she reached the end of the alley, she walked right past the man and arrived home safely.

The following day, she read in the newspaper that a young girl had been raped in the same alley, just twenty minutes after she had been there. Feeling overwhelmed by this tragedy and the fact that it could have been her, she began to weep.

Thanking the Lord for her safety and to help this young woman, she decided to go to the police station. She felt she could recognize the man, so she told them her story. The police asked her if she would be willing to look at a lineup to see if she could identify him. She agreed and immediately pointed out the man she had seen in the alley the night before. When the man was told he had been identified, he immediately broke down and confessed.

The officer thanked Diane for her bravery and asked if there was anything they could do for her.

She asked if they would ask the man one question. Diane was curious as to why he had not attacked her. When the policeman asked him, he answered, "Because she wasn't alone. She had two tall men walking on either side of her."

 

[FineLinen]

There are aspects of the Lord that are better felt than telt.

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"God is the God of the animals in a far lovelier way, I suspect, than many of us dare to think, but he will not be the God of a man by making a good beast of him." -George MacDonald-

 

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“Though we are incomplete, God loves us completely. Though we are imperfect, He loves us perfectly. Though we may feel lost and without compass, God's love encompasses us completely. ... He loves every one of us, even those who are flawed, rejected, awkward, sorrowful, or broken.” - Dieter F. Uchtdorf-

 

[FineLinen]

Flying with no hands

Oxford and Cambridge have now decided to remove the words CAN'T and IMPOSSIBLE from their dictionary.

Jessica Cox, 25, a girl born without arms, stands inside an aircraft. The girl from Tucson , Arizona got the Sport Pilot certificate lately and became the first pilot licensed to fly using only her feet. Jessica Cox of Tucson was born without arms, but that has only stopped her from doing one thing: using the word "can't."

Her latest flight into the seemingly impossible is becoming the first pilot licensed to fly using only her feet.

With one foot manning the controls and the other delicately guiding the steering column, Cox, 25, soared to achieve a Sport Pilot certificate.

Her certificate qualifies her to fly a light-sport aircraft to altitudes of 10,000 feet.

She's a good pilot. She's rock solid," said Parrish Traweek, 42, the flying instructor at San Manuel's Ray Blair Airport . Parrish Traweek runs PC Aircraft Maintenance and Flight Services and has trained many pilots, some of whom didn't come close to Cox's abilities.

When she came up here driving a car," Traweek recalled, "I knew she'd have no problem flying a plane."

Oxford and Cambridge have now decided to remove the words CAN'T and IMPOSSIBLE from their dictionary

 

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Friends

Friends love you tops when you are at the bottom.

Friends look up to you when the rest of the world is looking down.

Friends lets you step on their toes to help you get on your feet.

Friends show you the meaning of true friendship, not the meaningless of it.

Friends shoot straight with you, not at you.

Friends know most of your faults and care the least.

Friends tell you when you are wrong, and not everybody else.

Friends don't complain when you neglect them, only when you neglect yourself.

Friends let you worry them more than their enemies.

Friends want to know about your achievements as well as your losses.

Friends are behind you when you're taking bows and beside you when taking boos.

Friends don't split with you, when you flop, but split what they have.

Friends are your best press agents and they do this for free.

Friends have no greater love than to lay down their lives for their Friends.

 

[FineLinen]

Million-dollar gift 50 years in the making

Laurie Johnston took a gift of $200 more than a half-century ago and turned it into $1 million.

The retired pharmacist donated $500,000 on Friday to both the Misericordia Health Centre Foundation and the Riverview Heath Centre Foundation.

The impetus for his philanthropy dates back to 1949 when Johnston was a cash-strapped student in his fourth year of pharmacy school. He was considering taking a year off to work when a friend of the family called him over one day and handed him an envelope containing $200.

"That was a huge amount of money back then. She told me to use it for my schooling and pay it back for somebody else in the future," Johnston said.

His experience as a child of the Great Depression also played a key role in his philanthropic tendencies. Johnston's mother would cook for young men who would ride the railway in search of odd jobs to make a few dollars here and there.

"They'd knock on the door, sometimes two or three times a day, and she'd make them a big meal of soup and bread and pack them a lunch. She said to me, 'These men have nothing, no roof over their head, no food, so everybody should help them.' That made quite an impression on me," he said.

So, he decided to build a special legacy fund. Shortly after he graduated from university, Johnston started saving money and 22 years later, he had accumulated $80,000. In 1977, he immersed himself in the investing field and started putting money into the stock market.

"I hate the expression, 'Playing the stock market.' When you work like I do, you invest and you do it on a rational basis," he said.

Johnston never took a nickel out of the fund for himself and credited a simple mantra for being able to pull off his millon-dollar feat.

"Never buy what you want, just buy what you need," he said.

Sheldon Mindell, manager of Riverview, said Johnston's gift will be put towards refurbishing its 30 palliative care beds, including installing flat-screen televisions and a Wi-Fi system. Mindell also wants to upgrade a meeting area into a place where a family could eat a meal in relative privacy, rather than in the cafeteria.

"This donation is huge for us. I believe generosity isn't a characteristic you're born with. You learn it by examples that are set in your childhood or adulthood," Mindell said.

Patti Smith, executive director at Misericordia, agreed. She said Johnston's donation will be put towards its $7-million commitment to its Future of Care redevelopment program. Construction of the $45-million facility, which will house the Buhler Eye Care Centre, the Ambulatory Diagnostic Centre, and PRIME, a health centre for seniors, will begin next week.

"This isn't a rich man who gave away $1 million, he's a man who decided 35 years ago that he wanted to do something significant," Smith said.

 

[FineLinen]

The Old Fisherman -Mary Bartels Bray-

Our house was directly across the street from the clinic entrance of John Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore. We lived downstairs and rented the upstairs rooms to out-patients at the clinic. One summer evening as I was fixing supper, there was a knock at the door. I opened it to see a truly awful looking man. "Why, he's hardly taller than my eight-year-old," I thought as I stared at the stooped, shriveled body. But the appalling thing was his face - lopsided from swelling, red and raw.

Yet his voice was pleasant as he said, "Good evening. I've come to see if you've a room for just one night. I came for a treatment this morning from the eastern shore, and there's no bus 'til morning. "He told me he'd been hunting for a room since noon but with no success, no one seemed to have a room. "I guess it's my face... I know it looks terrible, but the doctor says with a few more treatments..."

For a moment I hesitated, but his next words convinced me: "I could sleep in this rocking chair on the porch. My bus leaves early in the morning."

I told him we would find him a bed, but to rest on the porch. I went inside and finished getting supper. When we were ready, I asked the old man if he would join us. "No thank you. I have plenty." And he held up a brown paper bag. When I had finished the dishes, I went out on the porch to talk with him a few minutes. It didn't take a long time to see that this old man had an oversized heart crowded into that tiny body. He told me he fished for a living to support his daughter, her five children, and her husband, who was hopelessly crippled from a back injury. He didn't tell it by way of complaint. In fact, every other sentence was prefaced with a thanks to God for a blessing. He was grateful that no pain accompanied his disease, which was apparently a form of skin cancer. He thanked God for giving him the strength to keep going.

At bedtime, we put a camp cot in the children's room for him. When I got up in the morning, the bed linens were neatly folded and the little man was out on the porch. He refused breakfast, but just before he left for his bus, haltingly, as if asking a great favor, he said, "Could I please come back and stay the next time I have a treatment? I won't put you out a bit. I can sleep fine in a chair." He paused a moment and then added, "Your children made me feel at home. Grownups are bothered by my face, but children don't seem to mind." I told him he was welcome to come again.

And on his next trip he arrived a little after seven in the morning. As a gift, he brought a big fish and a quart of the largest oysters I had ever seen. He said he had shucked them that morning before he left so that they'd be nice and fresh. I knew his bus left at 4:00 am, and wondered what time he had to get up in order to do this for us.

In the years he came to stay overnight with us there was never a time that he did not bring us fish or oysters or vegetables from his garden. Other times we received packages in the mail, always by special delivery; fish or oysters packed in a box of fresh young spinach or kale, every leaf carefully washed. Knowing that he must walk three miles to mail these, and knowing how little money he had made the gifts doubly precious.

When I received these little remembrances, I often thought of a comment our next-door neighbor made after he left that first morning.

"Did you keep that awful looking man last night? I turned him away! You can lose roomers by putting up such people!"

Maybe we did lose roomers once or twice. But oh! If only they could have known him, perhaps their illness would have been easier to bear. I know our family always will be grateful to have known him; from him we learned what it was to accept the bad without complaint and the good with gratitude to God.

Recently I was visiting a friend who has a greenhouse. As she showed me her flowers, we came to the most beautiful one of all, a golden chrysanthemum, bursting with blooms. But to my great surprise, it was growing in an old dented, rusty bucket. I thought to myself, "If this were my plant, I'd put it in the loveliest container I had!" My friend changed my mind. "I ran short of pots," she explained, "and knowing how beautiful this one would be, I thought it wouldn't mind starting out in this old pail. It's just for a little while, till I can put it out in the garden." She must have wondered why I laughed so delightedly, but I was imagining just such a scene in Heaven. "Here's an especially beautiful one," God might have said when he came to the soul of the sweet old fisherman. "He won't mind starting in this small body."

All this happened long ago - and now, in God's garden, how tall this lovely soul must stand.

Our Lives are not determined by what happened to us, but by how we react to what happens, not by what life brings us but by the attitude we bring to life. A positive attitude causes a chain reaction of positive thoughts, events, and outcomes. It is a catalyst, a spark that creates extraordinary results.

 

[FineLinen]

Irena Sendler

On May 12, 2008, a 98 year old Catholic social worker named Irena Sendler died in Poland. Here is why her story is so important... and TRUE!

During World War II, Irena, got permission to work in the Warsaw Ghetto, as a Plumbing/Sewer specialist. She had an ulterior motive...

Being German, Sendler KNEW what the Nazi's plans were for the Jews.

She convinced Jewish parents that their children were facing death either in the Ghetto or in concentration camps and offered to rescue them. She smuggled the children out of the Warsaw Ghetto and hid them in the homes of Poles, who adopted them, or in orphanages or convents. She smuggled infants out in the bottom of the tool box she carried, and smuggled larger kids in a Burlap sack.

She also had a dog, in the back of her truck, that she trained to bark when the Nazi soldiers let her in and out of the ghetto. The soldiers of course wanted nothing to do with the dog, and the barking covered up any noises the children might make.

Irena made lists of the children's names and family connections and hid them in jars in her garden so that someday she could find the children and tell them who they were.

Sendler was eventually discovered, arrested, and tortured (where they broke her arms and legs), and imprisoned by the Nazis. The Polish underground bribed a guard to let her escape and she spent the rest of the war in hiding.

During her time and the course of this rescue mission, she managed to smuggle out and save the lives of Twenty Five Hundred (2500) infants and older kids.

After the war, she tried to locate any of their parents who may have survived it all, and reunite the families. Most of the parents, however, had been eliminated in the famous gas chambers.

Last year Irena was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize.

She lost to Al Gore, who won for a slide show on Global Warming.

***** A teacher in a rural Kansas town discovered a short magazine article that claimed that a Polish woman saved 2,500 children from the Warsaw Ghetto in 1942 and 1943. He gave the story to four high school students and asked them to check it out. He said he'd never heard of the woman and speculated that the article may have gotten the facts wrong. The students looked into the story and discovered that Irena Sendler was real, her story was accurate. The students in Kansas developed a performance titled Life In a Jar that tells the story of Irena Sendler. Those performances and the publicity that resulted have thrust the news about Irena Sendler around the world. Irena Sendler was not widely known until a series of events that started in Kansas, U.S.A., in 1999.

 

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14-year-old dog Abbey

Our 14-year-old dog Abbey died last month. The day after she passed away my 4-year-old daughter Meredith was crying and talking about how much she missed Abbey. She asked if we could write a letter to God so that when Abbey got to heaven, God would recognize her. I told her that I thought we could so, and she dictated these words:

Dear God,

Will you please take care of my dog? She died yesterday and is with you in heaven. I miss her very much. I am happy that you let me have her as my dog even though she got sick.

I hope you will play with her. She likes to swim and play with balls. I am sending a picture of her so when you see her you will know that she is my dog. I really miss her.

Love, Meredith

We put the letter in an envelope with a picture of Abbey and Meredith and addressed it to God/Heaven. We put our return address on it. Then Meredith pasted several stamps on the front of the envelope because she said it would take lots of stamps to get the letter all the way to heaven. That afternoon she dropped it into the letter box at the post office. A few days later, she asked if God had gotten the letter yet. I told her that I thought He had.

Yesterday, there was a package wrapped in gold paper on our front porch addressed, 'To Meredith' in an unfamiliar hand. Meredith opened it. Inside was a book by Mr. Rogers called, 'When a Pet Dies.' Taped to the inside front cover was the letter we had written to God in its opened envelope. On the opposite page was the picture of Abbey & Meredith and this note:

Dear Meredith,

Abbey arrived safely in heaven. Having the picture was a big help and I recognized her right away.

Abbey isn't sick anymore. Her spirit is here with me just like it stays in your heart. Abbey loved being your dog. Since we don't need our bodies in heaven, I don't have any pockets to keep your picture in so I am sending it back to you in this little book for you to keep and have something to remember Abbey by.

Thank you for the beautiful letter and thank your mother for helping you write it and sending it to me. What a wonderful mother you have. I picked her especially for you. I send my blessings every day and remember that I love you very much. By the way, I'm easy to find. I am wherever there is love.

Love, God

 

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1st grader answers
A first grade teacher had twenty-five students in her Clarkston, MI class. She presented each child in her class the first half of a well known proverb and asked them to come up with the remainder of the proverb. It's hard to believe these were actually done by first graders. Their insight may surprise you. While reading, keep in mind that these are just 6-year-olds, because the last one is classic... although sad to see it said!

1. Don't change horses........................... until they stop.
2. Strike while the.................................. bug is close.
3. It's always darkest before................... Daylight Saving Time.
4. Never underestimate the power of..... termites.
5. You can lead a horse to water but....... how?
6. Don't bite the hand that..................... looks dirty.
7. No news is.......................................... impossible.
8. A miss is as good as a......................... Mister.
9. You can't teach an old dog new.......... math.
10. If you lie down with dogs, you'll........ stink in the morning.
11. Love all, trust.................................... me.
12. The pen is mightier than the............. pigs.

 

[FineLinen]

A prayer

Heavenly Father, help us remember that the jerk who cut us off in traffic last night is a single mother who worked nine hours that day and is rushing home to cook dinner, help with homework, do the laundry and spend a few precious moments with her children.

Help us to remember that the pierced, tattooed, disinterested young man who can't make change correctly is a worried 19-year-old college student, balancing his apprehension over final exams with his fear of not getting his student loans for next semester.

Remind us, Lord, that the scary looking bum, begging for money in the same spot every day (who really ought to get a job!) is a slave to addictions that we can only imagine in our worst nightmares.

Help us to remember that the old couple walking annoyingly slow through the store aisles and blocking our shopping progress are savoring this moment, knowing that, based on the biopsy report she got back last week, this will be the last year that they go shopping together.

Heavenly Father, remind us each day that, of all the gifts you give us, the greatest gift is love. It is not enough to share that love with those we hold dear. Open our hearts not to just those who are close to us, but to all humanity. Let us be slow to judge and quick to forgive, show patience, empathy and love.

 

[FineLinen]

How to be happy

Are you almost disgusted with life, little man?
I'll tell you a wonderful trick that will bring you contentment, if anything can
Do something for somebody, quick!

Are you awfully tired with play, little girl?
Wearied, discouraged, and sick -
I'll tell you the loveliest game in the world,
Do something for somebody, quick!

Though it rains like the rain of the flood, little man
and the clouds are forbidding and thick,
You can make the sun shine in your soul, little man
Do something for somebody, quick!

Though the stars are like brass overhead, little girl,
and the walks like a well-heated brick
and our earthly affairs in a terrible whirl,
Do something for somebody, quick!

 

[FineLinen]

“God has mercy on us. He says ‘yes’ to us, he wills to be on our side, to be our God against all odds. Indeed against all odds, because we do not deserve this mercy, because, as we rightly suppose, he should say ‘no’ to us all. But he does not say ‘no’; he says ‘yes’. He is not against us; he is for us. This is God’s mercy.” -Karl Barth-

 

[FineLinen]

Flying with chickens

Once, long ago, an Indian warrior found an eagle's egg on a mountaintop, and he put it in the nest of a barnyard hen. When the time came, the chicks hatched, and so did the little eagle, who had been kept warm in the same brood.

The tiny eagle grew along with the hatchlings. After some time it learned to cluck and cackle like chickens, to scratch the ground, to look for worms. And he would thrash his wings and fly a few feet into the air onto the lower branches of the bushes, just like all the other chickens.

Years passed and the eagle grew very old. One day he saw a magnificent bird above him in the cloudless sky. Up there in the bright blue, this bird glided with graceful majesty among the wind currents, with scarcely a beat of its strong golden wings.

The old eagle was awestruck. It turned to the nearest chicken and asked, "Who's that?"

The chicken looked up and answered, "Oh, that's the golden eagle, the king of the birds. He belongs to the sky. We belong to the earth... we're chickens."

So, the eagle lived and died a chicken, for that's what he thought he was.

-A fable from Anthony De Mello (Walking on Water)-

 

[FineLinen]

Angel at Presbyterian Hospital

A couple of Wednesdays ago, I got an evening phone call from the pediatric ICU at Presbyterian Hospital, in Charlotte, NC, where I work as a child life specialist. Usually when they call at night, it means something bad has happened. This, however, was different. My coworker told me that the most amazing thing had just happened and she just had to call to tell me.

We had a patient who has really grown up in and out of the hospital. All the staff knows her and her family. She had been in the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit (PICU) for about a month, and had been intubated - on life support. She was not doing well. The doctors had approached mom about taking her off life support the Saturday before. Mom was okay with it, and said that she’d been through so much and if was her time to go she wanted to honor that. So they had taken her off.

It was Wednesday and she was still alive. Amazing. The doctors approached mom about taking off her oxygen mask. Mom was supportive, and began praying over her daughter. The mother of another young patient who was in the bed next to her began praying with her.

The nurse practitioner went to the nurses’ station to chart that she had taken off the oxygen mask. While doing so, she looked up at the security monitor that videotapes the double doors leading into the PICU. It records anyone who may be waiting outside the doors to get in since it is a secure unit. She saw a man standing there, and it looked a little funny to her, so she decided to walk down the hall to open the double doors personally. When she opened them, no one was standing there.

She walked back down to the nurses station to finish charting, assuming he had walked away, but saw him still standing there on the monitor. So she opened the doors with a button near the nurses’ station and leaned over to see him walk in, but no one was standing there.

She pulled over another nurse and both stood staring at this man on the monitor and opening the doors to find no one there. The nurse practitioner leaned in closely to look at the man on the monitor and said, ‘Oh my gosh. That’s an angel. You can see his wings!’

They said that the sun starting shining so brightly and the whole PICU was strangely filled with light. They said he was a tall man and you could see wings behind him.

They pulled over all the staff of the PICU and the two praying mothers and everyone was staring at this man on the monitor and opening the doors to find no one there. Crying, everyone pulled out their camera phones to take pictures, but no one could get it to show up on their camera. The mother of the girl pulled out her camera phone and finally got a picture of the angel who was guarding the doors to the PICU. He turned out as a man of light. I have attached the picture from her phone.

The girl was later discharged from the hospital to go home.

A Miracle.

 

[FineLinen]

A grateful whale (As Reported In The SF Chronicle)

On the front page story of the San Francisco Chronicle on Thursday, Dec 15, 2005, you would have read about a female humpback whale who had become entangled in a spider web of crab traps and lines.

The fifty-foot whale was weighted down by hundreds of pounds of traps that caused her to struggle to stay afloat. She also had hundreds of yards of line rope wrapped around her her tail, her torso and a line tugging in her mouth.

A fisherman spotted her just east of the Farallone Islands (outside the Golden Gate) and radioed an environmental group for help. Within a few hours, the rescue team arrived and determined that she was so bad off, the only way to save her was to dive in and untangle her - a very dangerous proposition. One slap of the tail could kill a rescuer.

They worked for hours with curved knives and eventually freed her. When she was free, the divers say she swam in what seemed like joyous circles. She then came back to each and every diver, one at a time, and nudged them, pushed them gently around - she thanked them. Some said it was the most incredibly beautiful experience of their lives.

The guy who cut the rope out of her mouth says her eye was following him the whole time, and he will never be the same.