Information Related to "The Suitcase"
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I
look at the suitcase and memories well up inside. I should have thought
about vacations and positive times with family and friends. I should
have been excited about getting that suitcase out and trying to figure
out what to put in it or what to take out so I could shut it. But instead
my mind wanders back to a time when my suitcase had a different meaning.
A time when my suitcase took me on a completely different journey.
I was a little girl of 4 standing there watching my mother as she hurried
about gathering things and placing them in an open suitcase on the couch.
My mother carefully buttoned up my coat and then took my tiny, little hand
into hers.
She picked up the suitcase with her other hand and walked me out to a strange car where a strange lady waited. My mother placed the suitcase in the car and then slowly bent down with tears in her eyes and placed me in the car and walked away.
As we drove away I looked back to see my mother fading into the distance. I was not to see her for another 10 years. I sat there looking at the suitcase beside me, thinking about how my mother carefully packed my favorite dress and even placed my favorite stuffed monkey, Curious George, in it. Then I glared ahead at this strange woman driving me away to the strange unknown.
My painful and difficult journeys with my suitcase had begun. For no fault
of my own, my twin brother and I, along with one sister and two other brothers,
were taken from our natural parents and placed in a children's home.
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Table of Contents that includes "The Suitcase"
Other Articles by Janet Treadway
Re-published from an earlier version
God's calling: