There is a deep appreciation that I have not acknowledged, a personal moment that I will remember for the rest of my life. Where a person’s compassion was not afraid to speak in a moment when they could have remained silent. This gratitude I wish to extend to a stranger’s voice that reached me in my raw grief.

Sincerely, Deeply, Thank You.

Several years ago, I cried a daughter’s tears. I wept a deep anguish in the back of a bathroom stall. Hidden to the world, I refused to be seen, yet my silence could not be contained. In the acceptance of a sentence that was soon to occur, I bawled. Ugly, unforgiving sobs, cowering in the face of my future.

In the middle of my pain, not recognizing there was another person in the world, a voice drifted to me. A real individual whose face I would never see…