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Below is an actual letter sent to a bank. The bank manager thought it amusing enough to have it published in the New York Times.
Dear Sir:
I am writing to thank you for bouncing my check with which I endeavored to pay my plumber last month. By my calculations, three nanoseconds must have elapsed between his presenting the check and the arrival in my account of the funds needed to honor it. I refer, of course, to the automatic monthly deposit of my entire salary, an arrangement which, I admit, has only been in place for eight years.
You are to be commended for seizing that brief window of opportunity, and also for debiting my account $50 by way of penalty for the inconvenience caused to your bank. My thankfulness springs from the manner in which this incident has caused me to rethink my errant financial ways.
I noticed that whereas I personally attend to your telephone calls and letters, when I try to contact you, I am confronted by the impersonal, overcharging, prerecorded faceless entity which your bank has become.
From now on, I, like you, choose only to deal with a flesh-and-blood person. My mortgage and loan repayments will, therefore and hereafter, no longer be automatic, but will arrive at your bank, by check, addressed personally and confidentially to an employee at your bank whom you must nominate.
Be aware that it is an offense under the Postal Act for any other person to open such an envelope. Please find attached an Application Contact Status which I require your chosen employee to complete.
I am sorry it runs to eight pages, but in order that I know as much about him or her as your bank knows about me, there is no alternative. Please note that all copies of his or her medical history must be countersigned by a Notary Public, and the mandatory details of his/her financial situation (income, debts, assets and liabilities) must be accompanied by documented proof.
In due course, I will issue your employee with a PIN number which he/she must quote in dealings with me. I regret that it cannot be shorter than 28 digits but, again, I have modeled it on the number of button presses required to access my account balance on your phone bank service. As they say, imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.
Let me level the playing field even further. Press buttons as follows:
1.- To make an appointment to see me.
2.- To query a missing payment.
3.- To transfer the call to my living room in case I am there.
4.- To transfer the call to my bedroom in case I am sleeping.
5. -To transfer the call to my toilet in case I am attending to nature.
6.- To transfer the call to my mobile phone if I am not at home.
7.- To leave a message on my computer, a password to access my computer is required. Password will be communicated at a later date to the Authorized Contact.
8. To return to the main menu and to listen to options 1 through 7.
9. To make a general complaint or inquiry.
The contact will then be put on hold, pending the attention of my automated answering service. While on hold, pending the attention of my automated answering service. While this may, on occasion, involve a lengthy wait, uplifting music will play for the duration of the call.
Regrettably, but again following your example, I must also levy an establishment fee to cover the setting up of this new arrangement.
May I wish you a happy, if ever-so-slightly less prosperous New Year?
When I was only 18 months old, I was diagnosed with lead poisoning. I was supposed to end up in the hospital in a wheelchair.
My parents told me that the day I was brought into the hospital, my face was yellow and I wouldn't stop crying. The doctor said it was permanent. But in just one month, I went back to the doctor, and he said the lead poisoning was completely gone. My parents had prayed for me throughout the whole month, hoping it would go away.
My dad always drank.
My older brother and I always got scared of him when he came home drunk. One day, my dad had to go to the hospital because he drank too much. He was in the hospital for one month, and I prayed every day for him to get better. My dad was in pain and agony, and no medicine made him feel better. By the time my dad was able to come home, the doctor said he had one year to live.
My dad is now 52, and it has been six years. My dad stopped drinking when I got into second grade. It was a miracle. Ever since, my dad never drank again.
The doctor told me 11 years ago that I would be in a wheelchair, unable to talk, see, move or do anything. Yet in second grade, I was entered in a Talented Artist Program; in fifth grade, I was in honors classes; in sixth grade I was in a play and on two softball teams; and in seventh grade, I am in a play, am president of my class, and I am in a Documentary Film Club.
I thank God every day for the blessings he gave me. He is what motivates me and inspires.
Australian John Rendall and his friend Ace Berg bought the lion cub from Harrods in London in 1969 when the world famous store had an exotic animals department. Herrods had gotten the cub from Illfracombe zoo and it was on display at the store in cage when spotted by Rendall and Berg.
Christian lived in the basement of Rendall's flat in Chelsea and for a year was a pampered cat. And a clean one too, according to Rendall. He unfailingly used a very large kitty litter box and was jointly cared for by Rendall, Berg, and two of their female friends.
Christian eventually grew to nearly 200 pounds and started growing a mane, which made him look fearsome even though he was very friendly and accompanied his owners to all kinds of events. He became a feature at Rendall's furniture store and one day Bill Travers and Virginia McKenna walked into the store and saw Christian. They were actors who had been in the film Born Free, the true story of a lion cub named Elsa that was successfully rehabilitated into the wild in Africa by conservationist George Adamson and his wife Joy.
It was decided that Adamson and Africa might be the next destination for Christian. Adamson was cautious because Elsa had been an African lion born in Africa. Christian was from London and had lived a very different first year of life.
In Africa, Christian befriended a lion from the Born Free film named Boy. Adamson added a female lion to the friendships and began the process of educating Christian about the wild.
Rendell and Berg would visit from time to time to check on Christian's progress but it was in 1974 that Adamson told them that Christian had finally adapted to the wild. He had a litter of cubs, did not return to the camp very often and was the leader of his pride (Boy had been shot and killed in a tragic event near the camp.)
Upon hearing the news, Rendell and Berg decided they would make a final trip to say goodbye even though Adamson told them it might be a waste of time. Christian had not been seen in nine months. But when the two men arrived in Kenya Adamson told them that Christian and his pride of lionesses and cubs had arrived the night before, almost as though he had known they were coming. Adamson said Christian was sitting on his favorite rock outside the camp waiting for them. The reunion, as seen on the video, was one of overwhelming joy and tears. Afterwards Adamson warned that the lionesses didn't seem too pleased with what was going on so it might be time to leave. It was the last time that Christian was ever seen.
Watch a video of Christian and his lifelong family at YouTube
Like most elementary schools, it was typical to have a parade of students in and out of the health clinic throughout the day. We dispensed ice for bumps and bruises, Band-Aids for cuts, and liberal doses of sympathy and hugs. As principal, my office was right next door to the clinic, so I often dropped in to lend a hand and help out with the hugs. I knew that for some kids, mine might be the only one they got all day.
One morning I was putting a Band-Aid on a little girl's scraped knee. Her blonde hair was matted, and I noticed that she was shivering in her thin little sleeveless blouse. I found her a warm sweatshirt and helped her pull it on.
Thanks for taking care of me," she whispered as she climbed into my lap and snuggled up against me.
It wasn't long after that when I ran across an unfamiliar lump under my arm. Cancer, an aggressively spreading kind, had already invaded thirteen of my lymph nodes. I pondered whether or not to tell the students about my diagnosis. The word breast seemed so hard to say out loud to them, and the word cancer seemed so frightening.
When it became evident that the children were going to find out one way or another, either the straight scoop from me or possibly a garbled version from someone else, I decided to tell them myself. It wasn't easy to get the words out, but the empathy and concern I saw in their faces as I explained it to them told me I had made the right decision. When I gave them a chance to ask questions, they mostly wanted to know how they could help. I told them that what I would like best would be their letters, pictures and prayers.
I stood by the gym door as the children solemnly filed out. My little blonde friend darted out of line and threw herself into my arms. Then she stepped back to look up into my face. "Don't be afraid, Dr. Perry," she said earnestly,
"I know you'll be back because now it's our turn to take care of you."
No one could have ever done a better job. The kids sent me off to my first chemotherapy session with a hilarious book of nausea remedies that they had written. A video of every class in the school singing get-well songs accompanied me to the next chemotherapy appointment. By the third visit, the nurses were waiting at the door to find out what I would bring next. It was a delicate music box that played "I Will Always Love You."
Even when I went into isolation at the hospital for a bone marrow transplant, the letters and pictures kept coming until they covered every wall of my room.
Then the kids traced their hands onto colored paper, cut them out and glued them together to make a freestanding rainbow of helping hands. "I feel like I've stepped into Disneyland every time I walk into this room," my doctor laughed. That was even before the six-foot apple blossom tree arrived adorned with messages written on paper apples from the students and teachers. What healing comfort I found in being surrounded by these tokens of their caring.
At long last I was well enough to return to work. As I headed up the road to the school, I was suddenly overcome by doubts. What if the kids have forgotten all about me? I wondered, What if they don't want a skinny bald principal? What if I caught sight of the school marquee as I rounded the bend. "Welcome Back, Dr. Perry," it read. As I drew closer, everywhere I looked were pink ribbons - ribbons in the windows, tied on the doorknobs, even up in the trees. The children and staff wore pink ribbons, too.
My blonde buddy was first in line to greet me. "You're back, Dr. Perry, you're back!" she called. "See, I told you we'd take care of you!"
As I hugged her tight, in the back of my mind I faintly heard my music box playing... "I will always love you."
When I met 18-year old Patrick Henry Hughes, I knew he was musically talented. I had been told so, had read that he was very able for someone his age and who had been blind and crippled since birth.
Patrick's eyes are not functional; his body and legs are stunted. He is in a wheelchair. When we first shook hands, his fingers seemed entirely too thick to be nimble. So when he offered to play the piano for me and his father rolled his wheelchair up to the baby grand, I confess that I thought to myself, "Well, this will be sweet. He has overcome so much. How nice that he can play piano."
The original plan, I thought, would be this: We were going to talk a bit as he played. That was the plan. Hughes would explain how he managed to navigate the keyboard and how he first learned the piano and what his favorite songs were.
But then Patrick put his hands to the keyboard, and his fingers began to race across it -- the entire span of it, his fingers moving up and back and over and across the keys so quickly and intricately that my fully-functional eyesight couldn't keep up with them. I was stunned.
The music his hands drew from that piano was so lovely and lyrical and haunting, so rich and complex and beyond anything I had imagined he would play that there was nothing I could say. All I could do was listen.
That is the power of Patrick Henry Hughes. He quietly makes you listen.
'God Made Me Blind -- Big Deal'
"I mean, God made me blind and didn't give me the ability to walk. I mean, big deal." Patrick said, smiling. "He gave me the talent to play piano and trumpet and all that good stuff."
This is Patrick's philosophy in life, and he wants people to know it. He isn't fazed by what many of us would consider insurmountable obstacles.
"I'm the kind of person that's always going to fight till I win," he said. "That's my main objective. I'm gonna fight till I win."
Patrick also attends the University of Louisville and plays trumpet in the marching band. The band director suggested it, and Patrick and his father, Patrick John Hughes, who have faced tougher challenges together, decided "Why not?"
"That's right," the younger Patrick said.
"Don't tell us we can't do something," Patrick's father added, with a chuckle. He looks at Patrick with a mixture of love and loyalty and admiration, something not always seen. in the eyes of a father when he gazes at his son.
"I've told him before. He's my hero," the elder Hughes said.
Father and Son Together at Band Practice
Patrick's father attends every practice and every game with him, and learns all the routines. It's fascinating to watch them together, with Patrick focused on his trumpet's notes, swaying with the rest of the band in time with the music, and his father focused on being his son's eyes and legs.
And this is no sit-still-in-the-wheelchair-while-the-band-marches-around-you routine: Patrick and his father are right in the thick of it, with the wheelchair sprinting and spinning in formation and Patrick hanging on and playing his heart out.
Patrick says the other students in the band have been great to them.
"The students always help out Dad because sometimes he might get out of step," he explained impishly.
Patrick's father grins and nods. He concedes that navigating a wheelchair across the thick grass of a football field, in formation, sometimes at top speed, offers many exciting challenges for a man old enough to be the father of a college student. Fortunately, fellow band members are eager and willing to point him in the right direction.
"The biggest problem is sometimes when I'm backing up with Patrick, I can't stop quick enough." he said. "I'll have a horn player behind me, and they've gotten smart enough now that, rather than running into their horn, they put their hand up."
Blindness as a Gift and a Blessing
Some parents might see some bigger problems in all of this. For example, Patrick's father works an overnight shift at a shipping company and gets four or five hours of sleep so he can attend Patrick's classes and band practices with him all day.
Patrick's mother, Patricia Hughes, works full-time to supplement their income. She also takes care of the household, Patrick's medical needs, and siblings, and handles the concerns of every parent of a disabled child who looks down the road and wonders how it could possibly work out.
That's just not how the Hughes family looks at things. Patrick taught them to see it all differently, his father says.
"Back then he was born it was, 'Why us? What did we do that this happened to us?'" he said. "And we ask the same question nowadays, but we put it in a whole new light. You know, 'What did we do to deserve such a special young man, who's brought us so, so much."
Patrick John Hughes' gaze drifted again to his son, and both their faces lit up with smiles.
"He sees the world in a way that we can't even imagine," the father said.
Just listen to young Patrick and you know what his father means.
"I've always felt that my talent has really been a gift from God," he said.
Patrick includes his blindness, by the way, in the list of gifts.
"That's one of the great benefits I've found of being blind. I don't see the skin color, I don't see the hair length, I don't see the eye shape, I just see what's inside the person," he said.
Actually, Patrick said, blindness more than a gift to him.
"I would have to say a blessing, because overall, it's shown me a complete world."
That's how young Patrick Henry Hughes sees the world.
"He has so much more to teach me," his father said. "And I think to myself: I see just what you mean. He's taught me so much already.
LOL! Basically, all three of the forums are dedicated to this worldview. But if they won't adhere to your point of view you might as well get your jollies off insulting them. After all, you just want to be left alone.
Forty years ago two human beings changed history by walking on the surface of the moon. But what happened before Buzz Aldrin and Neil Armstrong exited the Lunar Module is perhaps even more amazing, if only because so few people know about it. "I'm talking about the fact that Buzz Aldrin took communion on the surface of the moon. Some months after his return, he wrote about it in Guideposts magazine.
And a few years ago I had the privilege of meeting him myself. I asked him about it and he confirmed the story to me, and I wrote about in my book "Everything You Always Wanted to Know About God (But Were Afraid to Ask)."
The background to the story is that Aldrin was an elder at his Presbyterian Church in Texas during this period in his life, and knowing that he would soon be doing something unprecedented in human history, he felt he should mark the occasion somehow, and he asked his minister to help him. And so the minister consecrated a communion wafer and a small vial of communion wine. And Buzz Aldrin took them with him out of the Earth's orbit and on to the surface of the moon.
He and Armstrong had only been on the lunar surface for a few minutes when Aldrin made the following public statement:
Buzz Aldrin
"This is the LM pilot. I'd like to take this opportunity to ask every person listening in, whoever and wherever they may be, to pause for a moment and contemplate the events of the past few hours and to give thanks in his or her own way."
He then ended radio communication and there, on the silent surface of the moon, 250,000 miles from home, he read a verse from the Gospel of John, and he took communion. Here is his own account of what happened:
"In the radio blackout, I opened the little plastic packages which contained the bread and the wine. I poured the wine into the chalice our church had given me. In the one-sixth gravity of the moon, the wine slowly curled and gracefully came up the side of the cup.
Then I read the Scripture, 'I am the vine, you are the branches. Whosoever abides in me will bring forth much fruit. Apart from me you can do nothing.'
I had intended to read my communion passage back to earth, but at the last minute [they] had requested that I not do this. NASA was already embroiled in a legal battle with Madelyn Murray O'Hare, the celebrated opponent of religion, over the Apollo 8 crew reading from Genesis while orbiting the moon at Christmas. I agreed reluctantly.
I ate the tiny Host and swallowed the wine. I gave thanks for the intelligence and spirit that had brought two young pilots to the Sea of Tranquility . It was interesting for me to think: the very first liquid ever poured on the moon, and the very first food eaten there, were the communion elements.
And of course, it's interesting to think that some of the first words spoken on the moon were the words of Jesus Christ, who made the Earth and the moon - and Who, in the immortal words of Dante, is Himself the 'Love that moves the Sun and other stars.'"
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