"I Just Did What I Could"

“I Just Did What I Could”

“Every time I visit with you, Marie, I learn something new about your life.  You are an amazing woman.” 

Marie leans forward in her wheelchair and glances down to avoid my admiring eyes.  Hands folded in her lap, Marie shakes her head as she dismisses my compliment.  “Oh, Kid,” she says, just a wisp of a smile lifting the corners of her mouth, “I just did what I could.” 


Marie is a wonderful storyteller, the sparkle in her eyes full of wit and wisdom.  At ninety-five, she is still a beautiful woman, with her silver hair coiffed and makeup expertly applied.  She dresses in comfortable, yet fashionable clothes, in soft hues that enhance her lovely complexion. 

As she reminisces about a special Christmas in the 1950s, her eyes take on a faraway look, wistful yet sparkling behind her spectacles…

“…At Christmas time, instead of buying each other gifts, our family decided to provide a nice Christmas for a family with eleven children who lived down the road.  Of course, people from church helped out.”  Marie wasted no time in enlisting an entourage of volunteers to help her provide necessities for this family that had captured her heart.  The father, Ralph, was unable to work, and it was a mystery how the family was surviving.

Marie and her husband Gene invited Ralph, Laura and the children to join their family to celebrate Christmas.  “After dinner, we gathered in our living room, and the children plopped down on the floor in a large circle.” 

“Knock, knock, knock!” 

“Who could that be?” everyone wondered.

“The door flew open and in came Santa Claus, with his sack of gifts slung over his back.  The children’s eyes were big as saucers.  We helped Santa pass out gifts for each of the children, and, do you know, Kid, they didn’t know what to make of them.”

Marie shakes her head, incredulous, and continues on.  “Why, none of them had ever received a gift before—and they didn’t know what to do with them.  Can you believe, we had to show them how to open them!  With a little help, they unwrapped the presents, being ever so cautious not to tear the festive gift wrap.”

“It was the best Christmas ever—for everyone,” Marie exclaimed, her face aglow.  “When you help someone that has nothing, and you see the joy they have, you get all the pleasure just knowing how happy they are,” Marie declares, decades later, her eyes just a bit moist…

…

Marie’s story actually began in a hospital room, the previous summer where Marie’s son Dick and his girlfriend Rita were visiting Rita’s father in the hospital, following back surgery.  Dick noticed that the other man in the room did not have any visitors. 

“Do you have a family?”  Dick inquired.

“Yes,” Ralph replied, with a chuckle.  “I have a wife and eleven children at home.”

Ralph’s home was approximately three miles from the family farm, so Dick volunteered to bring Ralph’s wife, Laura, to the hospital to visit him.

When Marie heard about the father with eleven children being unable to work, she went into action.  Every day, on her way to work, she dropped off two large containers of milk to the family.  When she approached the house the first time, Marie was astonished by the silence.  “Eleven children inside and not a sound of any kind!”  Mystified, Marie rapped on the worn down farmhouse door.

Laura cracked open the door and peered out, a wary look in her eyes.  Marie introduced herself and presented the two containers of milk for Laura’s children. 
Shyness overruled by curiosity, the children soon became well acquainted with their angel, Marie.

One day Marie asked Ralph if she could stop by on Friday evening and take two children home with her for the weekend.  “I’d like to take the children to church and Sunday school and then bring them home on Monday morning.”  She was surprised and delighted when Ralph agreed to her plan.  Thus, “two-by-two,” they came, every weekend.

Marie recruited her mother, an accomplished seamstress, to sew dresses for the girls and shirts and pants for the boys.  On Sundays, two clean-behind-the-ears children, dressed in crisp new outfits, walked into church with Marie.  “Everything was so new to them,” Marie muses, “so at first, I would stay with them during Sunday school, until they became accustomed to the teacher and other children.”

One of the highlights of the weekend was arriving back at Marie’s after church to be lured inside by the delicious aromas of dinner cooking in the oven and a hint of sweetness promising homemade pie for dessert.  When Marie served her famished friends, the kids cleaned their plates—Woosh!—in record time.  Marie marveled that not once did they ever say, “I don’t like that.”

With winter coming on, Marie’s husband Gene and Rita’s recuperated father Charlie began to winterize the old farmhouse where Ralph and Laura were raising their brood.  The industrious men applied plaster to damaged walls and taped and repaired windows.  With only one stove in the entire seven-room, two story house, Marie worried that the family would not be able to keep everyone warm during the harsh Indiana weather.  By this time, though, word had spread of how Marie and Gene were helping out the family, and friends and church folks pitched in, providing tons of coal to keep the family cozy.
…
As Marie drifts back into the present, she casts a mischievous glance my way.  With a “Jolly-Old-Saint-Nick” glint in her eyes, she grins and says, “It was Gene, my husband, you know, all dressed up as Santa.”

“Oh, Kid, you just can’t imagine!  And do you know, Kid, that they all have good jobs and go to church.”  With a pleased chuckle, she adds, “and they only have two children a piece!”

“Marie,” I respond, “you are amazing.”
         
“Oh, I just did what I could, Kid.”

…

And what do the children say? 

In 2004, Marie and daughter-in-law Rita went to Louisiana for a reunion with the family.  The now adult children surprised her with a birthday party.  In personal letters to Marie, they expressed their love and appreciation for her:

Annie reflected on their very first Christmas: “Why would they be helping us?  We could not give them anything.  They continued to come with gifts, food, and so much more.  These people did without to give us our very first Christmas…I loved them instantly…you are an angel, Marie.  I love you.” 

Sonny penned a touching poem: “We only hope and pray we will continue the torch of love she has put in our hands and heart… Your beautiful shining example will stay with us into eternity.  God sent you our way.” 

Sissy spoke in metaphors: “You were like a beautiful sunrise on a cool fall morning.  You lit a flame in my soul that will never be extinguished.  At one time, I looked at you as a Santa Claus, as a fairy godmother, as a savior.  Now I look at you as a dear, precious friend…  1Corinthians 13 talks about what love is, however it left out what love really is: Love is Marie.” 

Linda Elmore Teeple
(aka: Kid) 

Word Count: 1202