Correcting A Gross Misrepresentation

Yesterday Barbara White called me distressed because of something I wrote about her.

I want to set the record straight here.

I’m formatting four books Barbara wrote, the Along The Way series for Bluefish Books. These books collect newspaper columns she wrote about her pilgrimage following Christ in daily life. I feel these essays may be enormously helpful to other people interested in Christian living on a practical level.

The thing which distressed Barbara was a blurb I wrote for the back cover of each book in an “About The Author” section. (I posted a photo of one such cover in my September 1^st .blog).

I wrote that she “lives in a retirement community where she continues part of her Christian service in prayer and by spoon feeding paralyzed stroke victims in a near by nursing home”.

Barbara called me because she felt the statement misrepresented her.

She said she does not feed the stroke victims.

“I merely visit. Sporadically,” she said.

She said my statement was not true; therefore, she wanted me to change my statement on the book cover — a major undertaking.

I came up with an easier solution.

Instead of changing the four book covers, I suggested that she take a packet of peanut butter crackers over to the nursing home tonight and give one to each paralyzed person. That would make my statement about her feeding the sick true and it would be a whole lot easier than changing the blurb wording on four covers..

Christian humility and truthfulness can be a pain for the rest of us.

My suggestion appalled Barbara.

She does not want credit for acts of charity she did not do.

Now, why would I think she actually fed the patients?

Because of her overall character.

Her character which we’ve observed in the 20+ years Ginny and I have known her.

For instance, I know that she worked as a volunteer with a hospice program and that she also volunteered in a clothing center for the poor in Springfield, a slum, high-crime section of Jacksonville.

So naturally, when I read Barbara’s May 4^th blog posting “Dinner With Friends” about her visits to the nursing home, I misunderstood and I mistakenly assumed that she fed the patients there herself.

She doesn’t.

She does not spoon feed the stroke victims.

She found it distressing that I thought she did.

Why would I think that?

I know from personal observation that over the years she has taken in five troubled kids to raise in her home to save them from unstable environments.

So I naturally assumed she also fed sick patients in the nursing home.

I know that back when we were poor, she took me and Ginny grocery shopping to feed our kids, so naturally I assumed that today she fed the stroke victims as well.

I’ve seen the correspondence documenting that Barbara has long supported a missionary family in a remote section of Africa, so it was not much of a reach for me to think she ministered to old people close at hand.

I know first-hand (because I’ve driven the van) that she has donated vanloads of clothing and household good to city rescue missions right here in Jacksonville — so naturally I assumed that her sporadic visits to the nursing home, going over there on her own aluminum walker, included hands-on service, and I was under the impression that she actually spoon-fed the people with her own hand.

I was wrong.

Barbara insisted that I correct that misrepresentation

That’s what I’m doing with this blog post.

Barbara White just visits the folks in the nursing home.

She does not feed them..

What she does is — hidden in her purse, she sneaks a spoon into the nursing home unit; and when the attendants are not looking, Barbara whips out her spoon, she grabs the bowl of applesauce off the patient’s bedside tray — and she eats it all herself!

And while she does, she cackles, “… And your little dog too!”

She’s that kind of Christian.

I’m glad I could post this correction.