Sometimes in our lives, we are privileged to know some people who are truly extraordinary - angels, really.

They are angels, not because they transform the world with some new invention, or save the world by rescuing thousands.  But, because of the quiet influence they radiate on the people around them, the world is changed; it is refined and made a better place in which to live.  I know a whole family of angels, although they certainly would not consider themselves as such.  I don't know why they have had so many trials and so much heartache in their lives. It just seems to happen that way, sometimes.  Within that one family, some of the family members struggle daily with depression and bi-polar disorder. One of their children was diagnosed with a brain tumor when she was only 4 years old.  The tumor was successfully removed, but she will always her life as an eight-year-old. 

Other family members have struggled with other forms of Cancer, Stroke, Graves Disease, Hepatitis C, Hemophilia, and other diseases and conditions, too numerous to mention. (So many, in fact, that it is almost beyond belief.)  Because of their health difficulties, the family struggles in every way possible. Some are without jobs, because of their poor health. Most are not able to have health insurance, so finances are a constant worry.  I've spent more days than I every want to remember with them, worrying and waiting in cold hospital rooms.  

The thing that I find most remarkable, though, is that they don't let any of this interfere with their love of life, family and friends.  They always have a "project" of some kind under way.  It's amazing.  They work in the soup kitchen on Christmas day.  They organize food drives at Thanksgiving to make sure "the poor" people they know have enough to eat.  They make blankets for the women's crisis center.  They have even collected buttons to send to Africa, because women there needed them.