Renee Hawkley In Joy!

As the China Virus clutches its dark days in world history like a vice, consider these shocking numbers of persisting US deaths resulting from Heart Disease (over 655,000 deaths per year) https://www.cdc.gov/heartdisease/facts.htm , Abortions (over 600,000 per year) https://abort73.com/abortion_facts/us_abortion_statistics/ ,  and Obesity (over 300,000 deaths per year) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_obesity_rate .  That’s the short list. We don’t have a “cure” for the pandemic yet, but soon, we WILL. And I just wonder. When we know “scientifically” that some personal decisions affect our life spans and the life spans of others, can we give at least as much weight to our personal decisions as we give to the decisions coming from government edicts in 2020?  

  Vickie Lynn Johnson Raduechel (1945-2020) My name is Renee Thomas Hawkley. Vickie and I were best friends as young children in Shelley, Idaho. We lived a few houses from each other and played together nearly every day (abt 1950-53). Even a small child can recognize someone who is special, and I knew that Vickie was special. Her skin was flawless. Her hair had soft, natural curls, and her eyes sparkled in sunshine.  Her mother fussed with her hair daily, creating stylish ponytails and hairdos worthy of the teenagers or even the movie stars we admired. I remember glancing at Vickie out of the corner of my eye sometimes and wondering if she could hold still long enough to “freeze” into a porcelain doll just like the ones in department stores. She was that beautiful. I must admit, something else that drew me to Vickie was the television set at her house. My dad didn’t think our family needed one . . yet. While Vickie and I made the excuse of “tending” her brothers, Brent, and “D...