2-4-6-8, Who Do I Appreciate?

(Rick and Angela in my front yard the day they got engaged, 12/25/04)

Dream of Things publisher Mike O'Mary claims your notes of appreciation will make the world a million times better! He's on a mission to enlist a million people in The Note Project, encouraging us all to give voice to appreciation for the people who enrich our lives.


Visit his Note Project blog, and learn how writing notes of appreciation can promote literacy, and make you and somebody else feel better right now! http://noteproject.com/

Here's the note of appreciation I posted today, thanking Angela Wilson, my stepson's now-American wife!

I’m writing to thank my step-daughter-in-law, Angela Wilson, who this past week became a United States citizen. I met Angela in 2003 when I went to Moldova to do a Peace Corps health project review. She then worked as the executive assistant to Van Nelson, the Peace Corps director in that little Eastern European country. Already Angela had embarked on the first of a series of adventures, leaving her hometown of Serpenti to work in the bustling city of Chisineau.

My husband of three years often mentioned he hoped his middle son, Rick, would find somebody to share his life. Rick at the time worked as a meat packager at Costco while he went to school to get a master’s degree in teaching. He additionally taught as a substitute in various elementary schools in the Reno area. He didn’t have much time for dating or any social life at all.

Angela expressed interest in improving her written English and Rick, fond of the Internet, had corresponded with a number of women overseas. I linked the two together. Romance didn’t blossom at first. But after a couple of years of corresponding, Angela invited Rick to visit Moldova. He countered with an offer to pay for her airfare so she could see the United States.

On Christmas day, 2004, they took a long walk in the falling snow around my neighborhood in Northeast Washington, and came back engaged. Rick and Angela married in Serpenti in 2005, honeymooned in Moscow, and she came to the States that autumn. In June 2009, two weeks after my husband, Ken, died, Angela gave birth to my granddaughter, Kendra. My husband knew the baby would be a girl and would be named for him.

Though they now live in Casa Grande, Arizona, where Rick teaches third grade and Angela studies for a nursing degree, I’ll be seeing them this summer. I can hardly wait to congratulate citizen Angela in person.

Tomorrow’s Angela’s birthday. Happy birthday, citizen Angela Wilson! And thank you for enriching the lives of the entire family!