{"id":105,"date":"2010-04-28T08:19:08","date_gmt":"2010-04-28T14:19:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.alwayssupportourheroes.com\/WordPress\/?p=105"},"modified":"2010-04-28T08:22:17","modified_gmt":"2010-04-28T14:22:17","slug":"smiles-from-heaven","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.alwayssupportourheroes.com\/?p=105","title":{"rendered":"Smiles from Heaven"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_106\" style=\"width: 460px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.alwayssupportourheroes.com\/WordPress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/04\/100_2178.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-106\" class=\"size-large wp-image-106\" src=\"http:\/\/www.alwayssupportourheroes.com\/WordPress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/04\/100_2178-1024x768.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"450\" height=\"337\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.alwayssupportourheroes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/04\/100_2178-1024x768.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/www.alwayssupportourheroes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/04\/100_2178-300x225.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 450px) 100vw, 450px\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-106\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Love around the World ...<\/p><\/div>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000080\"><em>Everything in Haiti is done on THEIR time.  It doesn&#8217;t matter if you are  in a hurry &#8230; everything just takes time.  Which can be extremely  frustrating, especially when we (as Americans) have learned to  constantly be in a hurry and have things so instantly.  However, even  this week I witnessed the negative when someone rushes.  Words are not  said that need to be said, people do not do what they are supposed to  do, and even a project is not completed in a manner worthy of a stamp of  approval.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n<p><em>But yesterday, it was all about timing.  The tears streaming down my  face at various times, were because I believe it was and is &#8230; God&#8217;s  perfect timing.  For those of you that may not realize it &#8230; I was not  supposed to be in Haiti this week.  Let me give you a little recap &#8230;<\/em><em> <\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>Because of a volcano, I was not able to spend my vacation in Germany  visiting and volunteering with the USO Wounded Warriors.  Eric asked me a  month ago to find a way to get the Peace Packs delivered to  him in  Haiti.  When I helped Ruthie package &amp; ship the Peace Packs in S.  California 10 days ago, I had NO plans of being in Haiti right now.   Every day since shipping those boxes, I have been on the phone with Fed  Ex to make sure there were no issues.  Funny thing &#8230; the minute they  hit Haitian soil, there were issues.<\/em><em> <\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>As I explained previously, the government is corrupt.  The government  wanted us to pay duties and taxes on these little back packs that were  literally filled with love and prayers from children in America to the  children here in Haiti.  The fact of the matter is, it took alot of  work, tenacity, and resolve to get those boxes out of customs without  having to pay duties and taxes.  It was a God moment when they let us  put the Peace Packs in the car.<\/em><em><\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>But yesterday, it wasn&#8217;t just one moment &#8230; it was a culmination of  knowing how hard I worked to get the Peace Packs here &#8230; and seeing  Ruthie&#8217;s project come full circle for her.  She would not have been  here, had one of my friends not given me a buddy pass for her to use.   If I had not gone through,  the hoops with the translator that I went  through &#8230; we would not have made the contact we needed to, in order to  get a much larger and vital shipment into the country (more on this  later).<\/em><em><\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>You see, God can see the big picture &#8230; we can&#8217;t.  And although there  is death, starvation, dehydration, and tents all around us &#8230; I can see  the beauty of us making a difference.  If different steps had been  taken, the result may not have been the same &#8230; and I am thankful that I  listened to that still, small voice inside &#8230; that told me to &#8220;come&#8221;  &#8230; because the beauty of following &#8230; is hearing God say &#8220;well done&#8221;  &#8230; and that is far better than any words can really describe &#8230;<\/em><em><\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>And for those of you who don&#8217;t believe in God &#8230; take a situation where  you feel a tremendous amount of JOY.  Where the universe has aligned,  and you are just brimming from ear to ear.  That is how I felt several  times yesterday.  Where the love you feel inside .. the admiration ..  the gratitude .. is so enormous that you explode with emotion.   When  you look yourself in the mirror and really like who you see.<\/em><em><\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>Now that my friends, is a really good day.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Everything in Haiti is done on THEIR time. It doesn&#8217;t matter if you are in a hurry &#8230; everything just takes time. Which can be extremely frustrating, especially when we (as Americans) have learned to constantly be in a hurry and have things so instantly. However, even this week I witnessed the negative when someone [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[8,4,9,7,6],"class_list":["post-105","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-can-do-org","tag-donations","tag-haiti","tag-humanitarian","tag-volunteering"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.alwayssupportourheroes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/105","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.alwayssupportourheroes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.alwayssupportourheroes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.alwayssupportourheroes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.alwayssupportourheroes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=105"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.alwayssupportourheroes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/105\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":108,"href":"https:\/\/www.alwayssupportourheroes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/105\/revisions\/108"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.alwayssupportourheroes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=105"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.alwayssupportourheroes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=105"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.alwayssupportourheroes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=105"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}