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Dear Sikik: A Letter To Sikik Eegeesiak From Louisiana Sandusky by Karen Lynn Vidra, The Texas Tornado
Tuesday, August 3, 2004
Rated "G" by the Author.
Louisiana writes a letter to a new friend she has met through the Internet. Her new friend lives in Alaska, all the way up north in Barrow, and after seeing her latest entry via her email, she feels compelled to write to her.
Tuesday, August 3, 2004~
Dear Sikik Grace Eegeesiak (whew!),
Hello all the way from sunny, hot Tennessee all the way up there to cold, snowy Barrow, Alaska! How are you doing? I hope this finds you well!
I saw your journal entry on the Internet, and I thought I would write to you. You were saying that you were lonely, and that you wanted some mail besides junk or spam, so I decided to write to you. So you know Jenna Aurora Whitson. Small world; seems I know her too! (She was injured in a car accident on her way to Louisiana from Alaska last year, and I took care of her while she spent time in our hospital. She was badly injured: she was in the hospital for five months, from November, just before the Thanksgiving holiday, until April of this year, and during her stay and long recuperative period, she and I became very good friends; and we have remained friends to this very day. She is a very sweet lady, and I am sorry she has been having problems; hopefully, now that the surgery on her back is overwith and done, she can get back on her feet, and hopefully, life will start treating her a lot nicer!)
To tell you about myself, Sikik, my name is Louisiana Mayrah Therese Sandusky, and I am 35 years old (turned 35 in June, on the 10th). I am short (very short; I am only 4'7 1/2" tall!), but very fat; and I have very long, black hair that is very thick in nature, black eyes, and dark skin, and I am rather blessed up front, if you know what I mean! LOL I am very happily married (13 years to the same man!), and my husband (his name is Bill, by the way) and myself are the proud parents of 50 children, all of them adopted. Our children resemble a mini-United Nations: they come from all over the world, from places like South and Central America, Asia (China, Vietnam, Korea, Japan, India, etc.), Europe (Germany, France, Bosnia, The Netherlands, Russia, etc.), the Middle East (Iran), and the Americas (Canada and the United States), and they are all sweet, loving children. They have all grown up quickly, and some are getting ready to leave the nest (or, in the cases of our oldest daughters, have ALREADY left the nest). Our children range in age from age five and a half on up to a grown up 22 1/2, and we are grandparents several times over. My oldest daughter, the 22 1/2-year-old) has five children, two just born on July 4 (both boys, twins).
Our children are also considered "special needs", for a lot of them (but not all) have serious physical or mental disabilities that have affected just about every aspect of their young lives. Yet they have refused to let their disabilities hamper any goals they may have, and they have adapted to life's many challenges beautifully and splendidly. The non-disabled ones have become our disabled members' biggest support team, mini advocates for rights of the disabled, as it were, and it is because OF them that our disabled kids have triumphed over heartbreaking odds, and they still continue TO do so today. I wrote a book about our International Family last year entitled "A Family Made Out of Rainbows And Miracles: The Sandusky Family Story, A True Story of Love And International Adoption", and it has been selling relatively well in the local market. If interested, I can send you a copy; but first I need your snail addy so I can get it off to you, pronto. Now, I don't know how the mail delivery is up there all the way in remote Barrow, Alaska, but hopefully, you should have it a few weeks after I have shipped it off to you. Anyway, please do let me know if you want to have a copy of my book, and I will send it off to you, pronto! (I will even autograph it personally to you, at no charge; consider it a gift of friendship from me!)
So, Sikik (I LOVE your name, by the way; I LOVE the way it rolls off my tongue, when I practice saying it, but then I am probably saying it all wrong, seeing I do NOT speak Inutpiak! LOL), do tell me about yourself. You have a big family, judging from what you said in your letter. Twelve children, eh? WOW! I come from a big family myself, but you have me beat by a country mile! LOL I am only one of five, but all girls. I have no brothers, and all but one of my sisters are still alive. My oldest sister, Georgia, died in a plane crash nearly eight years ago, when our first two adopted children (Johnny and Ronee') were only four. They will be twelve in December. So it has been eight years now since Georgia has gone on to Glory, and all these years later, I still miss her very much! My sisters are named after states: besides me (Louisiana) and my deceased sister (Georgia), there's also Indiana, Florida, and Arizona. We also have an adopted sister (the "Baby" of the Bunch!) who is called Crystal, and we "statesiders" kiddingly tease her and call her the Family Oddball because she doesn't have a State for a name! (If she WERE a state, she'd probably be called Alaska! LOL)
I was born on June 10, 1968, in Breaux Bridge, Louisiana, which is near Lafayette, and my sisters and myself were raised in true Cajun (French) tradition. We grew up learning both French and English as our official languages, and at home we spoke French; but outside our home, English was the thing! Daddy and Maman both taught us girls to be proud of our Acadian ("Cajun") French heritage, and we grew up learning all about the trappings that went along with our heritage: the language, the music, the food, and whatnot, and they taught us that there was nothing wrong with being a "Cajun", and this was something that was instilled in us when we were very tiny. I had a very happy life, but at the age of nine, I was injured, and for the next several years, I walked on leg braces and Lofstrand crutches because for a time I was partially paralyzed; but by the time I became a teenager, I learned to walk unaided, and I did so until about five/six years ago, when I was forced to go on a cane because of arthritis that settled in my back and in my hips and legs, making it harder for me to get around. I still use a cane even now when I walk, but on longer trips, I use a wheelchair or an electric scooter, especially at my job (I am a nurse; I work at Nashville Memorial Hospital, and I am the charge nurse of the day shift) or if I go to places like the zoo, Wal*Mart (or ANY store, really!), or to the Grand Ole Opry or OpryMills (it used to be Opryland, but the amusement park folded, and a shopping/entertainment complex was made instead). Happily, the Grand Ole Opry is still running and going strong!
I did have three children of my own (by my husband), but unfortunately, tragedy hit us, not once, not twice, but three times: all three of our biological children died. Our oldest son, Aron Jakub, would have been nearly 17/18 now, and our middle child (another boy), Pierre Armand (he was named after my daddy) would have been nearly ready to start driving a car by now. Our only daughter, L'Acadia Marie Antoinette, would have been 14 now. Aron died on what would have been his fourth birthday from cerebralspinal meningitis, and our middle child, our younger son, died of SIDS at the age of six days. Our daughter had been born several months premature, and she was just too small and too sick to be able to survive on her own; plus it did NOT help that she had contraced meningitis from another baby who had it while she lay fighting for life in the NICU. But I didn't write all this down to depress or bore you; it's just a fact of our lives, and I wanted you to konw that we had children prior to our adopting the children we have today. It is still a painful, difficult topic to talk about, and even now my eyes prick with tears at the thought of our own deceased children, but they are better off, and they are now in Heaven, with Jesus, waiting for us. And we shall be with them soon! Oh, what a happy day that will be! :)
But that is now behind us, and life does go on, as we have learned over the years. Life has its ups and downs, and we are living proof of that! (We just seem to have had more than most of life's ups and downs! LOL) But through all the bad times we have encountered, our family has only been made stronger, and we have learned to rely on God to get us through the valleys; and somehow, no matter what we may face or go through in life, God ALWAYS manages to get us through, and we emerge into the light, victorious and happy once again! HALLELUJAH! :)
Now I am an "old granny" LOL, and I have grandkids to spoil, in addition to taking care of our own big brood, and life is very busy at best. We are happy, and God has blessed our family beyond measure; and it is funny, but it seems that I can't imagine life without God or any of the children we have adopted! Life has been nothing but an ongoing learning experience or series of adventures (in OUR case, MISadventures! I could write several more books about our family! LOL), and we have enjoyed every minute of it! LOL (Well, maybe NOT, but that is beside the point...LOL)
Forgive me for bending your ear, but my brain is going faster than my fingers can type, and I am just blathering at the mouth again (I have a very bad habit of that; I have always been told that I was the chatterbox of the family, and that still stands today!). I do hope you will forgive me for that. If I get going too much for your ears (or your eyes, as in this case), please do tell me to shush! I will! LOL But writing is something I have always enjoyed, and even as a very young child growing up in Cajun Louisiana I can remember creating and writing up stories, or reading any book I could get my greedy little hands on! LOL I was a TRUE "Bookworm"! (Still am! That is, WHEN I can find some spare, free time to do so! "Free time"..WHAT is that???)
Well, Sikik, I DO believe it is time to let you go. I've bent your ears for far too long already; I can just picture you thinking, "Doesn't this yakky Tennessee woman EVER shut up???" LOL I will write more later. Until then, take care, and I hope you enjoy the book I will be sending you along with this letter! (You DON'T have to pay me back; remember, it is a GIFT!) God bless you too!
(((HUGS))) and much love, your new friend in Tennessee, Louisiana Mayrah Therese Sandusky. :)
P.S.: The picture that is on this letter is NOT of me. It is of my favorite country singer, Loretta Lynn! :D (Just thought I would clarify things, so you don't think it was Loretta Lynn writing to you! LOL Loretta Lynn, I AIN'T!! LOL)
P.P.S.: I tried to find a picture of the Nashville skyline, or a picture of the Grand Ole Opry, but nothing seemed to suit my fancy; so this was why I put a picture of Loretta Lynn singing. After all, Nashville, Tn. IS the Country Music Capital of the world, so who better to represent country music than Loretta Lynn? She's about as "Country" as you can possibly get! LOL
Yankee Doodle Daddy is a historical Appalachian Family Saga. The story follows a mother's reckoning as she struggles to survive and keep her four daughters alive.
Yankee Doodle Daddy is a historical Appalachian Family Saga. The story follows a mother's reckoning as she struggles to survive and keep her four daughters alive.
Tuesday, August 3, 2004~
