i’m in awe

That’s my friend Amy. Six years ago we met at the bus stop as she and her husband Sam were hustling Cameron onto the bus for his first day of kindergarten, as we were doing the same for L.

In the interim, Amy and Sam had a second son (now 3), Cameron and L. grew to be best friends, and our lives became linked. But then Sam’s mental illness returned, and he started self-medicating with alcohol, drugs and gambling, injuring not only their marriage but their financial stability and Amy’s ability to leave the kids in his care while she worked or studied. In the last two years, Amy lost not only her marriage but her home, having to move herself and the boys three times during the untidy process of first separation and then divorce.

I’ll never know how Amy made it through such darkness to Saturday’s triumph, graduating magna cum laude and earning not only the Chancellor’s Award – given each year to one outstanding student at WSU’s Vancouver campus – but the University-wide President’s Award as well.

Amy’s passion is social justice, and there has been no time in my life when our country has needed compassionate, indefatigable fighters like Amy more.

I am so proud of her, but even more than that, I’m grateful that someone with Amy’s gifts would choose service. She’s proven herself capable of anything, and what she has chosen to do is help the least among us.

Congratulations, Amy. You amaze me.