Celebrating Moms

4 Responses to Celebrating Moms

1. RHT447 says:

   Sunday, May 12, 2013 at 11:55 am

   MOM is WOW spelled upside down.

   Who Packs Your Parachute?

   “Charles Plumb, a Naval Academy graduate and fighter pilot in Vietnam,
   after 75 combat missions, had his plane destroyed by a surface-to-air
   missile. He ejected and parachuted into enemy hands, was captured and
   spent 6 years in a Communist prison.
   He survived that ordeal and now lectures about lessons learned from that
   experience.

   One day, when Plumb and his wife were sitting in a restaurant, a man at
   another table came up and said, “You’re Plumb! You flew fighters in
   Vietnam from the Kitty Hawk and you were shot down!”

   “How in the world did you know that?” asked Plumb. “I packed your
   parachute,” the man replied. Plumb gasped in surprise and gratitude. The
   man pumped his hand and said, “I guess it worked!” Plumb assured him,
   “It sure did-if your chute hadn’t worked, I wouldn’t be here today.”

   Plumb couldn’t sleep that night, thinking about that man. Plumb says, “I
   kept wondering what he might have looked like in a Navy uniform-a Dixie
   cup hat, a bib in the back, and bell bottom trousers. I wondered how
   many
   times I might have passed him on the Kitty Hawk. I wondered how many
   times
   I might have seen him and not even said ‘Good morning, how are you,’ or
   anything because, you see, I was a fighter pilot and he was just a
   sailor.”

   Plumb thought of the many hours the sailor had spent on a long wooden
   table in the bowels of the ship carefully weaving the shrouds and
   folding
   the silks of each chute, holding in his hands each time the fate of
   someone he didn’t know.

   Now, Plumb asks his audience, “Who’s packing your parachute?

   Everyone has someone who provides what they need to make it through the
   day.” Plumb also points out that he needed many kinds of parachutes when
   his plane was shot down over enemy territory-he needed his physical
   parachute, his mental parachute, his emotional parachute, and his
   spiritual parachute. He called on all these supports before reaching
   safety. His experience reminds us all to prepare ourselves to weather
   whatever storms lie ahead.
2. Peggy says:

   Sunday, May 12, 2013 at 1:40 pm

   WOW! RHT, thanks for sharing.

   A Mom
3. Tina says:

   Sunday, May 12, 2013 at 3:39 pm

   I agree…great, great story!

   I hope all the young and potential moms out there understand just how important their role is in helping their children to develop physical, mental, and emotional parachutes…strengths and supports that will see them through the ups and downs of everyday living as well as the types of trials Charles Plumb faced.

   We never know when we might be called upon to pull ourselves up…right, RHT447?
4. RHT447 says:

   Sunday, May 12, 2013 at 10:22 pm

   “We never know when we might be called upon to pull ourselves up…right, RHT447?”

   Indeed. I’m sure any of us could expand on this, but this is Mother’s Day, so I’m going to give it a rest.

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