Smiley Faces

Rita sat in her doctor’s office looking through a magazine. I’d written a story of how God used an obstinate prison cell mate of mine to teach me about love and obedience. In the article I also revealed I have a daughter named Rita. I wrote how prison had separated me from my daughter and how I longed to establish a relationship with her.

Rita was touched by the story. She, too, had been separated from her daughter. The court had finally granted her custody. Now she and her twelve-year-old daughter were together. Their love for each other was growing daily.

Then the doctor told Rita she had cancer. The prognosis was not good, but she reached out to me with understanding because she knew how it felt to long for a relationship with one’s child. She was more concerned about my sorrows than her own and began to write to me regularly.

It was easy to tell when I had a letter from Rita. She covered the envelope front and back with smiley faces of all sizes and colors. Sometimes she even put them on the letters inside the envelope.

“She must spend all her time decorating envelopes,” said one of the men in the mailroom. Rita wanted to know everything about me. Her letters were long and frequent. She wrote every day.

Rita didn’t see cancer as a tragedy but as an opportunity to tell others about Jesus Christ. She was full of life and energy. She refused to allow this disease to get her down. She started chemotherapy. She wrote, “My hair is shedding like a dog’s. Don’t’ be surprised if you find hair in my letters. Next time you write, you can call me Baldy.”

I addressed my next letter to her, “Dear Rita, a.k.a. Baldy.” I always promptly answer anyone who writes me. Still, I couldn’t’ keep up with Rita. The same was true with her questions. The more questions I answered, the more she asked. Sometimes I didn’t know what else to write. What could I say to someone who was battling cancer?

Anyway, I had to deal with my own catastrophe—a 45-year sentence for robbery. I saw no future. However, Rita was persistent and didn’t complain when I failed to answer her questions or respond right away. Instead, she would put a self-addressed, stamped envelope in her letter. When I didn’t answer all her questions, she’d highlight them with a marker. Or she’d write a categorized list of questions on a separate piece of paper and title it, “List of questions for Roy to answer.”

The irony of it all struck me. A total stranger, with the same name as that of my daughter, wrote me every day. Yet my daughter Rita remained silent and refused to answer my letters.

According to the doctors, life for Rita was going to be very short. She wasn’t going to see her daughter graduate from high school. Nevertheless, for Rita every day was a blessing. Every day she saw something beautiful to appreciate, such as reading stories with her daughter curled up beside her and tickling her when she was mad to make her smile. She took one day at a time, cherishing every moment.

One part of me was afraid to get involved; a relationship with Rita would only lead to more pain. Another part reminded me not to fear pain. God has been able to teach me the most through the things I have suffered.

In spite of myself, I began looking forward to Rita’s letters. Rita and I shared our feelings, regrets, hopes, and dreams. The loneliness of prison and the loneliness of cancer drew us to one another. We both grew closer to God as we shared our lives. Being Christians didn’t give us a free pass from the pain of life. Instead, as our pain intensified, we drew closer to God. He understands our greatest need. He knows our anguish, hurt and pain. The sorrows of life will come, but God has a plan. That hope makes the bitter tears of today bearable.

Rita seldom complained about her pain. She was full of encouragement, as if what I was facing was worse. She told me to think of others first: “Be a light in the dark, Roy, and God will bless you. Let others see how you handle your circumstances. By your life, become an ambassador for Christ.”

Nine months after we began writing each other, Rita wrote that the chemotherapy wasn’t working. The cancer was spreading rapidly. The doctors said they would have to operate. It didn’t sound good, but Rita didn’t give up hope. The smiley faces kept coming. “If Jesus doesn’t heal me, “I’ll be waiting for you in heaven,” she wrote.

Before the operation, I asked several of the Christian brothers in my dormitory to pray for her. We gathered around my bunk, and men who did not know Rita prayed for her. We all signed a get-well card, and I mailed it to her.

After the operation, Rita wrote that it had been a wonderful surprise to find the card waiting for her. “Nothing could have made me happier,” she wrote. She promised to write every one of them back, but she was unable to keep that promise.

I should have known something was wrong when I didn’t get any mail from her for a week. Finally, Rita’s sister wrote to tell me she was back in the hospital. It dawned on me that Rita might die.

“Lord, please don’t let her die,” I prayed. I knew God could perform the impossible—He had changed me.

Yet the impossible wasn’t going to happen for Rita. I knew it before I read the words of her sister’s next letter. “Rita went to be with the Lord May 16” it said. Later in my bunk, alone in the dark, the tears flowed. Rita was gone. We had known each other for only a year, but it seemed like a lifetime.

As I reminisced about Rita, I remembered how she signed her letters: “Agape, Rita.” She told me it meant she had unconditional love for me.

Prison, like cancer, can become an indescribable fear. It can dominate, cripple and, for inmates, seem to make life useless—or it can draw one closer to God. Rita taught me that life’s circumstances are not the problem; the problem is not trusting God.

Two days before Father’s Day, I received a card from my daughter Rita. My prayers were answered. She wanted me to become a part of her life. The best part was the way she signed off: “Love, Rita.”

Later, as I walked the prison exercise track, I thought about my friend Rita. I pictured her on her knees, praying for me. I missed her.

Suddenly it began to rain. The rain poured down like giant teardrops. Everyone ran for cover. I stood there getting drenched, but I didn’t care. The rain mixed with tears in my eyes. Just as suddenly as it had begun, the rain stopped. I looked at the blue sky and saw a beautiful rainbow.

It reminded me of what Rita once wrote: “Stay on your knees and remember that the God who makes rainbows appear makes dreams come true.”

A smile crossed my face as I thought of her in heaven somewhere over the rainbows, waiting for me with a smiley face.