A benefit to help the Brewer family with medical expenses after the death of their son, Taylor Brewer, 16, will be 3-10 p.m. Saturday at Page High School.

“It hit the community so hard,” said Bonnie Ozburn, one of the benefit organizers, about Taylor’s death after a wreck on Feb. 11.

Tracy Brewer, Taylor’s mom, has seen the community bonds grow even deeper through all this. “The people, the school, the kids have been awesome,” Tracy said, adding that they still get cards. “It’s helped us heal.”

When the idea for a fundraiser came up about a month ago, Tracy wasn’t sure she could handle it.

“I didn’t want to go. It would be too much,” she said. “But now, I know this is an opportunity to say thanks to people, even though thank you is never enough. I’m looking forward to it now. It’ll be like a big supper with 300 friends.”

Brewer attends baseball games, where her son would be playing. “This is what we’ve done since he was 7,” she said. “I tell people, ‘We can choose to let one day, one horrible day affect our lives or we can choose to remember 16 whole years.’ ”

Silent and live auctions and live music from Southern Comfort will be part of the event at the school at 6281 Arno Road, southeast of Franklin. A live auction starts at 5 p.m.

“They have to deal with the loss and then have to deal with the bills,” said Ozburn, who owns Bonnie’s Barnyard in Triune. “We can’t get Taylor back, but we can ease some of this.”

Community businesses and individuals donated auction items. Some of the donors are Mattress Gallery Direct, Thomasville Furniture, Discount Tire, Mycom Systems, Pop’s Car Wash, Marriott Cool Springs, Embassy Suites and A Moment’s Peace and Kim and Mike Butler.

Beef stew, chili, barbecue and lots of other food will be served. Local places donating food include Whitt’s, Martin’s, Bar-B-Cutie and Fat Boys.

“We’re expecting about 300 people on the low end,” said organizer Laura Totty, who owns Tot-e-Town Childcare. “I hope everyone comes hungry.”

Cost is $12 for adults, and $6 for children 10 and younger. Children age 5 and younger are admitted free.

For more information, call Totty at 615-521-9903 or Ozburn at 615-395-7679.

 People are often unreasonable, irrational, and self-centered.  Forgive them anyway.

            If you are kind, people may accuse you of selfish, ulterior motives.  Be kind anyway.

            If you are successful, you will win some unfaithful friends and some genuine enemies.  Succeed anyway.

           If you are honest and sincere people may deceive you.  Be honest and sincere anyway.

            What you spend years creating, others could destroy overnight.  Create anyway.

            If you find serenity and happiness, some may be jealous.  Be happy anyway.

            The good you do today, will often be forgotten.  Do good anyway.

         Give the best you have, and it will never be enough.  Give your best anyway.

         In the final analysis, it is between you and God.  It was never between you and them anyway.

Our family on the way to our liver ultrasound

We all dread getting the "phone call". The one from your doctor when you have gone in for tests, because something is just not quite right. We all pray that the words on the other end will be "everything is fine- nothing to worry about". But what happens when those are not the words you hear? What is your response?

The reason I am writing this is because our family just received that phone call. You see, my husband was feeling a bit "off", and so he called the doctor. I was extremely proud of him, because as we know, guys do not like to call the doctor -EVER! My sweetheart has high blood pressure and some other challenges, so off he went to get blood work done. And then we did what we all do in these situations: we waited.

When my phone rang during work, I was surprised because normally he waits until our show is over to call me. I could hear the anxiety in his voice as he relayed the doctor's message: his liver numbers were off. WAY OFF. We needed an ultrasound. But of course, by then it was Friday afternoon, so we had to wait. Ugh!!

As we made it through our weekend, we decided to talk through everything, as we did not know what news Monday would bring. You do the typical best case/ worst case scenario over and over. Even though my husband and I are very open with our communication, we realized that some things were never discussed. This gave us the time to talk about the hard things that we chose to ignore, because quite frankly, it is just too darn painful to even imagine that the worst can happen to us. But guess what: the worst CAN happen to any of us. I am not saying that to be a negative nellie at all, but we are grateful that this deepened our relationship, even though I kinda liked being blissfully ignorant.

Thankfully, the ultrasound was fine. We now wait to see what the doctor says is next- but in the meantime, we know that no matter what, we are a family and we will get through whatever this is...together.

So, my challenge to you is not only to hug and love on those special people in your life, but to be brave enough to talk about EVERYTHING, even the hard stuff. If a wimp like me can do it, you can too. Trust me, your loved ones will thank you for it.

"Dear children, let’s not merely say that we love each other; let us show the truth by our actions." 1 John 3:18

Today is National Potato Chip Day and I am celebrating! What is your favorite chip?

My favorite is the one I happen to be eating at the moment!