HCBA Lawyer Magazine Vol. 28, No. 5 | Page 5

E D I T O R ’ S
M E S S A G E
E d C o m e y - L a w C l e r k t o U. S . B a n k r u p t c y Ju d g e M i c h a e l G. Wi l l i a m s o n
they Didn’t have to Be
in honor of national foster care month, i’d like to thank all foster
parents for being the parents they didn’t have to be.
B
rad Paisley, arguably one of the best country
music songwriters over the last 20 years, said
that one of the best pieces of songwriting
advice he ever got was to “make sure you
have a great opening line.” It has to be
something, Paisley says, that makes you want to hear the
rest of the song. But the other day on my drive in to work,
I caught the tail end of an old Brad Paisley song I hadn’t
heard before, and it was the last line of the song that made
me want to hear the rest of it:
I hope I’m at least half the dad
that he didn’t have to be
Cause he didn’t have to be
The song, Paisley’s first number one hit, tells the
story about a stepfather’s
relationship with his
stepson. The song begins
with the stepson recalling
how his single mom used
to wonder whether she’d
ever meet a man who
wouldn’t turn and run as
soon as he learned she
had a kid. But then she
meets the man she would
eventually marry. When
the man first asks her out
to a movie, he invites her
son to go with. Years later,
when the stepson is having a child of his own, he realizes
all his stepfather has done for him.
Paisley says that what makes a song great to him is
when it makes you feel an emotion you hadn’t planned on
feeling. Perhaps that’s why the last line of that song
(pardon the pun) struck a chord with me.
Ten years ago, my brother Mike and his wife,
Colleen, decided to become foster parents. Over the
years, they fostered nearly 50 children — kids who were
taken from their homes and placed with my brother and
sister-in-law until their parents could straighten their
lives out.
During the time those kids were part of my brother’s
family, they were blessed to have loving parents; a
wonderful big sister (Macey); and grandparents, aunts,
and uncles who loved and cared about them. Although
it has been years now, I still remember most of the kids
Mike and Colleen cared for. Two, in particular, will
forever have a piece of my heart. Mike and Colleen
adopted my niece Olivia and my nephew Joey from the
foster care program. Every day, I’m thankful Mike and
Colleen chose to be parents they didn’t have to be.
May is National Foster Care Month. And the
first Tuesday in May is
National Foster Care Day,
which is dedicated to all
the children in the U.S.
foster care system.
The statistics tell a
heartbreaking story: More
than 250,000 children
enter foster care each
year; only half of foster
children graduate high
school; foster children
suffer PTSD at twice
the rate war veterans do;
and nearly 20 percent
experience homelessness within a year of aging out of the
system. National Foster Care Day is intended to highlight
the problems plaguing our foster care system, in particular
the nationwide shortage of foster parents.
The only real hope foster children have is that more
selfless parents will volunteer to foster children in need.
In honor of National Foster Care Month, I’d like to
thank all foster parents for being the parents they didn’t
have to be.
© Can Stock Photo / zimmytws
M AY - J U N E 2 0 1 8
|
HCBA LAWYER
3