“You can always,always give something, even if 

it is only kindness!” 

by Shauna Brown 

     Last night,  while my sweetheart and I tended five of our grandchildren, my grandson Reed, informed me: “We need a story now.” Evidently a closing story for the day is one ritual his family holds tightly to.  We had read scriptures, said family prayer, and I thought I had shared a good story, but evidently not good enough.  So,  sitting on Jamison’s bed I told them about Anne Frank.  How she and her family and a few others lived in a secret room above an attic for two years. Anne and her family were Jewish, and Hitler was a evil ruler who wanted  to cleanse the world from Jewish, people.  Her family was forced to go into hiding. 

     Anne had been given a small book for her thirteenth birthday.  She wrote within it’s pages her feelings, fears and moments of hope. It later became known as, The Diary of Anne Frank.  Because of her writings, many people have a better idea of how it must of been for those who were hunted down by Hitler and his Nazis Party.  I  asked the boys to imagine living in their bedroom and never leaving it for years.  The Franks and a few others survived for two years before someone reported them to the Nazis. Despite her limited opportunities and restraints, it seems that Anne appreciated the simple things of life, and counted her blessings. I told my grandsons  how Anne found joy around her. Looking through a window she could see the sky and use her imagination. I’m sure Anne was filled with hopes and dreams for a better future. Anne had shared with her written word her appreciation of life and her outlook of it.  It would have been wonderful if I could have remembered a few of her thoughts.

“As long as this exists, this sunshine and this cloudless sky, and

as long as I can enjoy it, how can I be sad?” Anne Frank

Then I asked my little boys what they were grateful for.  We talked about our blessings and how grateful we are for that which we sometimes take for granted.  We talked about our eyes and Helen Keller, or fingers and legs that let us walk. I told of Nick Vujicic ,who lives without arms or legs and yet appreciates his life.

Oh, I am grateful that a young girl of thirteen wrote within her little journal.  She always dreamed of being a writer someday. Without knowing she was, and lives on.  

“How noble and good everyone could be if, every evening before falling asleep, they were to recall to their minds the events of the whole day and consider exactly what has been good and bad. Then without realizing it, you try to improve yourself at the start of each new day.” 

“How lovely to think that no one need wait a moment, we can start now, start slowly changing the world! How lovely that everyone, great and small, can make their contribution toward introducing justice straightaway... And you can always, always give something, even if it is only kindness!” 

     So this Sabbath day might we all look around us and imagine how we can improve ourselves and become all that we are meant to become.  

I hope some day I can meet the girl call Anne Frank, for she has made such a marked difference within my soul.  I believe that God planted within her heart the will to live, and share eternal purpose. I am thankful that I know Anne lives on. 

Love always,

Shauna