I listened to the words given when I first learned about The Giving Keys: Give your key to someone in need of your word. I kept that promise and I originally wore my POWER key because I also thought at the time that I needed a little more power in my life. POWER to move forward, POWER to stand still, POWER to empower. The list goes on. So I stayed patient and waited for the right moment.
I went to high school with a girl who I ended up mentoring in hockey at a very competitive level. I took her under my wing and off she went. She got a scholarship for NCAA University hockey and was lighting it up. Then tragedy hit. One night she and a couple of friends were out, and a drunk driver came barreling down the road, headed right toward them. She bravely pushed her friend out of the way and got hit entirely by that driver. It broke her back, leg, knee - you name it. Hockey became a distant memory. She survived, recovered, rehabilitated, and courageously got back onto the ice. Finally in her stride, with a heavy past behind her, her grandma passed away. Again, finding her stride after grieving her loss - a massive fight breaks out with her father, and they didn't talk for a year. Soon after that, her step-mother passed away. This was a blessing in disguise because it was a tragic loss but also a time where she and her father could reconnect.
After all of this extreme heartache and frustration - she came back to finish off her NCAA hockey career. She graduated and returned home to get her life on a path that she wanted. To this day she still has problems with pain, lots of knee issues, and no luck in getting those sorted out. We hung out recently, and she approached me about my necklace - the first person to ask me about what it meant. The tangent went on about this company - and as I finished telling her about it, I got an overwhelming feeling that she deserved my necklace. Without any hesitation, it was in her hands, and I hope she uses it to hold all the POWER she can.
-Vanessa
