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Deep Compassion for Children
A few weeks ago, I spent the day with an 11-year-old boy with cancer who wanted to come out to California and meet me. The trip was arranged through Make-A-Wish. He'd never flown on a plane, and his wish also included going to Disneyland and to Universal City. We rode the rides, had lunch and played miniature golf -- we just had the best time. The hard part for me is when the "wish day" is over and you're supposed to say goodbye. Most of these children are terminally ill, so when you're granting their wish, you know you may be seeing them for the last time. There was a point when I thought, I cannot do this. Then I realized that before a child passed away, I was able to put a smile on his face. So I told myself it would be really selfish to let a little pain stop me from doing a lot of good.This boy -- I just couldn't let him go. So now, for however long he's here, he's in my life. I talk to him all the time. He wants to see how a movie's made, so whatever movie I do next, I told him he could come and see what that's like.
So many of the kids I've spent time with through Make-A-Wish are struggling with being different in one way or another -- because of their race, their socioeconomic situation, or just their illness. The mere fact that they have a potentially terminal illness sets them apart, and many of them suffer, at such a young age, the effects of being made to feel different because of that. I think back to when I was young. My mother was white, my father was black, and I've always felt different and sometimes out of place. I talk with these kids about my experiences and about how they can deal with being different.
I have such deep compassion for children, and the joy that comes from helping them is immeasurable. I desperately want children of my own, and hope I haven't missed the chance. But if I have, I've also learned through my own life experience that I have the capacity to love as my own a child who is not my own. And I know I will keep embracing children like the little boy I spent the day with -- sort of my extended family of children.
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