New Year Resolution 2007
My New Year Resolution is expressed in the poem by Edgar A. Guest Lord, Make a Regular Man out of me:
"This I would like to be – braver and bolder, Just a bit wiser because I am older, Just a bit kinder to 
those I may meet, Just a bit manlier taking defeat; this for the New Year my wish and my plea- Lord, make a regular man out of me.
This I would like to be – just a bit finer, More of a smiler and less of a whiner Jut a bit quicker to stretch out my hand Helping another who’s struggling to stand, This is my prayer for the New Year to be, Lord, make a regular man out of me.
This I would like to be – just a bit fairer, Just a bit better and just a bit squarer, Not quite so ready to censure and blame, Quicker to help every man in the game, Not quite so eager men’s failings to see, Lord, make a regular man out of me.
This I would like to be – just a bit truer, less of a wisher and more of the doer, Broader and bigger, more willing to give, Living and helping my neighbor to live! This for the New Year my prayer and-my plea – Lord, make a regular man out of me."
0 thoughts on “New Year Resolution 2007”
Is Edith still alive?
Cassidy
yes, she’s alive. She came and spoke to my class last year. Very nice woman.
yes, she’s alive. She came and spoke to my class last year. Very nice woman.
yes, she’s alive. She came and spoke to my class last year. Very nice woman.
Edith’s book is wonderful.
I don’t think Edith’s mother shared a hospital room with Anne Fank’s mother. The book begins with Edith talking about having her twins in 1950, after the war, and sharing a hospital room with Miep Gies who had helped hide Anne Frank’s family. Miep had just given birth to her first child and she told Edith about Anne Frank and how Anne Frank’s father was going to have his daughter’s diary published, and Edith thought to herself that the diary was one of thousands of wartime diaries, and that she even had a diary from that time but that it seemed that people didn’t want to think or read or talk about the war in Holland anymore. I loved the honesty of Edith’s book. I think it is one of the most relate-able accounts of WWII that I have read. Edith talks about the erosion of rights and dignity and how easily it was accepted at first, the incredible tragedies that struck her family and pretty much all the people she knew, how she stayed positive, and also how after the war, her anger and sadness crashed down on her finally. She was strong throughout the war, and it was not until afterwards that she was able and had to confront the reality of having lost her parents, one of her brothers, and grandmother. Anyway, that was the connection between Edith and the Anne frank in the hospital.
I highly recommend reading Edith’s book in combination with her husband Loet Velmans’ book “Long way back to the River Kwai.”
I was prompted to look for stories like Edith’s and Loet’s after a visit to Amsterdam and the Verzetsmuseum about the Dutch occupation and resistance. WIthout question a more moving experience than seeing Rembrandt’s finest works.
“What would you do?” is the disarmingly simple yet profound question posed at the Verzetsmuseum.
Edith’s story shows how minor errors, seemingly simple cooperation, and delayed decisions compound into life and death choices for each member of her family. Loet’s book reveals how even bold, successful actions have unexpected consequences. He escaped the Nazi invasion of Holland to England, joined the Dutch Army, was shipped to Indonesia, only to be forced to surrender to the Japanese after Pearl Harbor. He documents how he survived years in Japanese POW camps including the Burma railway death camps.
What is most remarkable is that these two people, Edith and Loet, reveal their experiences, even the embarrassing ones, to us not as heroic stories, but as stories of two ordinary teenagers whose simple quest for life became extraordinary.
It was an awesome book! Does anyone know if she is still alive? It is 2015.