I not only associate butterflies with Samantha, I also have a story about pennies.  The weekend before the Fourth of July holiday Samantha slept over to my parents house, just to spend time with them. 

I have two older sons, Michael, and Bobby.  Bobby was the one involved in the accident and survived.  My sister has a daughter Kaitlyn who is three weeks younger than Samantha.  My sister and I were pregnant at the same time, which made it special for us.  The girls have always been close, and did many things together.  They looked at each other as sisters rather than cousins.  Sometimes my parents liked to do things with each separately.  A day or two before the scheduled sleep over, I needed to go to K-Mart.  I took Samantha with me.  She told me she wanted to buy something for my mother.  All the kids call her “Me-Maw.”  My oldest son started that when he was a baby, and I would call my mom on the phone, and say, “its me, mom “Me-Maw”. 

I went to K-Mart to buy a card.  I happen to have been looking for something inspirational that day for my dad’s sister, who has lung cancer.  I was concentrating on the things I was reading while Samantha read a few cards herself.  She could read very well, and I was amused with her, as she now comprehended the humor in some of them.  I chose the one I wanted, and moved down the aisle.  “Oh here they are,” she cried.  “The magnets I wanted.”  I looked at them and said, “well, honey, they are nice, but wouldn’t you like to chose something else for Me-Maw?”  “Could we just look at some other things,” I said.  Part of what was in my mind was that I did not want to pay $3.99 for a magnet.  “OK mommy, but I will just hold onto this one just in case.  It says grandma, but she’ll know I mean Me-Maw.” 

We walked around looking at this and that in the store.  I was surprised she had not fussed more.  Most often, when Samantha made up her mind about something, she had no problem letting you know about it.  Not to say she was bratty or anything like that, but especially when it came to gifts for someone she was firm.  She held onto that little rectangular 3x3 magnet the whole time we looked, with both of her hands.  I had made a mental note about her willingness to consider something else, to mention to her later that I was proud of her grown up behavior. 

When it looked like nothing else suited her, I stopped and asked her “honey, why do you like this magnet so much?  Why do you want Me-Maw to have it?”  “Well,” she said, “it has a lucky penny on it”!  She continued, “it tells Me-Maw how much I love her, and that she is special to me.” 

That was a good enough reason for me.  Along with that, her compliancy over the whole matter, we got her the magnet.  I did get to tell her in the car on the way home how proud I was of her behavior in the store.  She had not even asked for anything for herself either. 

There is a story I would like to tell of Samantha that is probably one of my favorites.  It exemplifies the true spirit of my daughter’s heart.

Samantha had a friend in her second grade class named Kara.  Kara was also in her dance class for a short time, so I knew who she was.  Kara was a very sweet and shy girl.  She was a little over weight and children teased her quite a bit in school. 

One night while Samantha was getting a bath and I was washing her hair, she told me about her friend Kara.  “Mommy” she said, “I do not know what to do.  The kids at school make fun of me because I am Kara’s friend.  They tell me if I am her friend, they will not be mine, and that no one will come to my birthday party if she comes.  I want to be her friend mommy, I just don’t want to be teased anymore.” 

I could tell this has been bothering her and she was still struggling with it.  My mother’s heart wanted to go to those kids myself and make them stop, but I knew I had to let her handle this herself.  So I said, “Well honey I can not tell you what to do, but we can talk about it.”  I then asked her, “Do you like Kara”?  “mmmmm” she said.  I asked her “Do you have fun together?  Is she nice to you?”  She said “Uh huh”.  I then said to her “well then, you will have to think about it and decide what you want to do.”  She did not say any more about it for the rest of the bath.

Then, I did not hear anymore about it until parent teacher conferences.  Her teacher, Miss Mullen asked me then if I knew anything about her little friend Kara.  I told her that Samantha had mentioned her and that she was having a hard time with the kids because she was her friend.  Miss Mullen told me that things had got so bad with the teasing, that one day, she send Kara to of the room for something, just so she could talk to the whole class about their behavior.  It seems that with the exception of Samantha, everyone was being hard on the little girl.

The teacher told the class that she wanted it to stop right now.  She told me she was tough on them because the teasing was getting out of hand.  She could see the effect it was having on the little girl.  Somewhere around that time, Samantha and Kara were out on the playground together.  I guess someone called over to Samantha to come and play.  She turned to Kara and said “come on lets go play.”  The other kids said to Samantha, “no not Kara just you Samantha.”  Well she would not go without her friend, so they started to give her a hard time. 

In this group were a bunch of boys.  Samantha was always the smallest one in her class, so there is no question that they were bigger than her.  I was told, that she got between Kara and the group of boys, with hands on hips.  She took a stance and confronted the boys.  I can just see her eyes flashing as he pointed her finger at them and said “how would you like if someone treated YOU that way!  How would you like it if someone did not want to play with YOU!  You all need to back off and learn how to be nicer to people, then maybe you will have friends!”  I guess she stomped away in anger for her friend, and they continued to play together the rest of the recess.

Now when I heard this I went home and told her how proud I was of her.  I realized that this little girl stood up for what she believed in against kids that were bigger than her.  Like Samson against a Goliath, she had courage and strength of conviction.  She stood up for what she believed in.  There are adults in the world that cannot do that.  I am still so proud of her.  I hope that the rest of Kara’s life, she carries with her the gift of Samantha’s friendship and love.  This was Samantha’s heart.

These are Samantha’s words.  There is a girl who hugs me good night.  She is the best mom I ever had, and when she smiles, she makes me glad.  I am happy you are my mommy because I love you more than anything in the world, so do you me.  I hope you enjoy reading this mommy.