Bright, friendly, with a smile that warms your heart. That's how Chrissy Owens is described by Oak Elementary staff and schoolmates. Everyone knows who she is and everybody loves her. It's apparent that Chrissy, an 11-year-old with the smile everyone has memorized, has an extended family - her Oak family. The fifth-grader who has attended Oak Elementary since she began kindergarten will be spending the summer months away from home to receive care and treatment for a condition she was born with called osteogenesis imperfecta (brittle bone disease). For the first three months she will be treated with halo traction at Shriner's Hospital in St. Louis, followed by surgery to attach a rod to her spine to help strengthen the bones. Traction is necessary prior to the surgery to achieve the best possible spinal alignment. After the traction treatment, Chrissy will be moved to the Children's Hospital in St. Louis for the surgery and the care she will need by the intensive care unit. Chrissy and her mom, Teresa, left for St. Louis on April 23. She has already begun her treatment and is being very brave, according to her grandmother, Phyllis Napier of Memphis. Chrissy's dad, Doug, will remain here with their oldest daughter, Ashley, a junior at Bolton High School. Family members will travel often to St. Louis to visit with Chrissy and relieve Teresa. Chrissy hopes to be home in time for the new school year. Eager to assist the Owens family with travel and living expenses, Chrissy's Oak family (staff and students) organized a campaign they named "Caring for Chrissy." Throughout the week of April 17-21 donations poured in from Oak families and others in the community. Although the campaign was held for a momentous cause, it also brought some fun to Chrissy and her schoolmates. A tally of collected donations was taken daily by each class. The class with the highest donations earned the privilege to participate in activities such as Pajama Day, '60s Day, Spirit Day and Superhero Day. Collected amounts were so impressive that more than one class participated daily in the scheduled activities. At the end of the week, Chrissy's family was invited to the school for a special presentation. After just four days of collecting donations the school proudly presented the family with an $8,500 check. The Owenses were overwhelmed with the demonstration of love shown for Chrissy and their family. Principal Patricia Rowland agrees that is overwhelming, "It is amazing how the staff and students here get involved. It is truly like a family around here. The students really understand why and what we were doing this week." "The families of Oak and people of the community opened their hearts and the donations poured in," added Rowland. During the ceremony, Chrissy's classmates also presented her with some special gifts to take with her to St. Louis, including a laptop computer, so she can keep in touch this summer. Toward the end of the presentation, Chrissy, who is usually on the other end of this type situation - giving not receiving - gave everyone the smile that has become so well-known throughout the halls of the school and waved to her friends and humbly said, "Thank you, thank you for everything." Her smile said it all. ************************************** It always amazes me how most of the time the people who really have something to gripe and complain about, and who have reason to look at life in the negative, are the ones who look positively at life and who endure the most difficult times with a smile. Remember, life is what each and everyone of us makes it. We can make our life at the home, out in society, and in the workplace so much happier an so much more enjoyable when we learn to not allow our circumstances and our "problems" to control us. Just by simply smiling and seeking to bring joy and happiness into the lives of others, we can reap real joy and happiness ourselves. We're all tempted to gripe and complain when we have a "bad day", and in doing so, we pass our bad attitude along to others. But when you stop and really think about it, the things that make us have a "bad day" are quite ridiculous and really nothing that we should let affect us in the way in which we so often do. When you think about people such as the girl in the story above, who look at their problems and troubles and say; "so what ... I'm still going to smile!", we ought to learn an extremely valuable lesson. Marilyn L. Ali