Gratitude & Faith

When I was six, I traveled on my first airplane. I remember the feeling of leaving behind my little Scottish life for something unknown. My elementary teacher had me stand up in class and present me with a special book as a gift from my class. I still have that book entitled, “The Grateful Crane”. My teacher wrote me a lovely message about how I would be missed. I felt so special not just because I would be missed but because of what I was going to. Even at six, I understood in a child-like way that it must be something significant for my parents to sell their home and leave their family behind to go and live in a little wooden hut in the middle of the Amazon region of Brazil.

I have many memories of that time, but the one that will forever stand out as special is when I asked Mum and Dad to pray for me. I wanted to know more about faith and what it meant to live as someone who believed in something and someone greater than myself.

Gratitude overwhelms me as I reflect on this part of my journey. Like the grateful crane, I am so thankful for my parents, who have nurtured and cared for me and shown me the way of faith.

Decades later, I would have the amazing opportunity to live in Brazil as an adult, and I would have so many more stories to tell!