Lynda's Sweet Voice

God continues to bless us in so many ways.  As many of you know (or have read in the blogs) Lynda spoke some words between the ages of three and ten.  I have no videos of Lynda during that time because they weren't available yet.  I had one video with a short clip that was used in a Title XX news article that was aired in Jackson but through the years I've lost it and there are no players available to show it anyway.  So, the only thing I had was a cassette of her saying Nana and some of her other words and laughing.  For 30 years I have kept that cassette in by dresser drawer.  Then we moved and I put it into a box and didn't find it again until last summer when we were organizing boxes in the new storage building.  I didn't really realize that it was in the bottom of the box that I sat on the back porch AND I didn't realize that the back porch leaked.  So the treasured cassette sat in water for a week or so before I realized what it was and headed inside to try and dry it without destroying the 30 year old tape.

It has sat in a bowl in my kitchen on a shelf for almost a year.  I've been afraid to even try it to see if it still worked.  Last night, I decided I had to know.  Russ went to mother's house and borrowed her cassette recorder and we prayed and played the tape while recording it on the laptop.  Sometimes a tape is so fragile that it may play only one time, if at all.  The quality wasn't great but the sweet voice that was laughing and saying Nana was perfect.  I hadn't remembered that we had made that cassette to try and get Lynda to say as much as we could coax out of her so it had added bonuses that are treasures and reminders of the little girl that came to live with Larry and me 39 years ago.  It was bittersweet that Larry's voice was on that same tape talking to the little girl he loved so much.  It was before either Kevin or Kristopher were born but packed along with Lynda's cassette was a tape of Kris singing happy birthday to me and another one of Kevin at about 5 singing happy birthday to me.  The final tape was of the two boys when they were about 6 and 3 singing Christmas carols and occasionally fighting about something.  These tapes made me cry but it was because I was laughing so hard and so happy to hear Lynda's sweet voice again.  I will share it in the blog later when we get the noise removed as much as possible.

Thank you God for protecting Lynda all of these years and for protecting the only recording I have of my little girl talking.  You are such a loving Father who never takes your eyes off even the tiniest sparrow.