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Reason #517 Why to Love Perfect Strangers: One Young Woman, 13 Young Lives
Posted: Mon 07/11/2011 02:45 PM | By: Leigh Newman
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Photo:ThinkStock
Photo:ThinkStock
Where were you at 22? Crashing in Mom and Dad's basement, hiding from an ego-piercing job market? Slinging lattes at the local espresso shop--an activity complicated by various piercings and projectile hair "experiments?" Racing off to work as an administrative assistant, hoping that somebody would notice your stellar labeling skills in the file cabinet and promote you to "MOST IMPORTANT PERSON IN THIS MULTINATIONAL CORPORATION?" (Okay, that one was me...and by the way, neither the job title, nor the accompanying gold sticker I so feverishly imagined, panned out.) 

This weekend on NPR, I heard  this story about Katie Davis and felt compelled to go hug my own kids--over and over--until they made me stop. Davis, at age 22, gave up her own dreams of being a nurse in order to remain in Africa, where she had been volunteering, and raise 13 orphaned or otherwise needy girls. Her plan is to one day adopt them. 

"I think that's definitely something that I was made for," said Davis. "God just designed me that way because he already knew that this is what the plan was for my life--even though I didn't."

Her first child was an HIV positive 9-year-old who was injured when a mud hut collapsed. She asked if she could live with Davis--and Davis, then age 19, said yes. Thus began her new life, as a mother and full-time resident of Uganda where she and the girls live, complete with an oversized minivan.

In her spare time, Davis also runs a nonprofit called Amazima Ministries, a job  supports the family of 14. There she oversees educating 400 other children, setting up community health programs and feeding more than a thousand children five days a week. 

My first task tomorrow is to promote her to "MOST WONDERFUL HUMAN BEING" and send her a gold-star sticker--and a donation--that officially affirms the title. 

Note: This article has been changed as of July 12, 2011. 

 

Topics: Life Lifters, Relationships, Parenting
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