The slide had a tunnel covering the top. None of the other kids played on it, so I decided to hide in the tunnel. We had just moved to Illinois because my dad had been asked to pastor a local church. I was not adjusting well to the small, rural school where I was now enrolled. At my old school I had been the vice president of my class. Here, the other girls laughed at me and teased me about my clothes and shoes. At my old school our teacher had stood at the back door of the classroom and hugged us goodbye every day. Here my teacher was strict and gave so much homework that my dad called her “the queen of the worksheets.” I don’t think she liked me. However, I was not in the tunnel to hide from the Worksheet Queen or the other girls in my class. I sat in the cool, dark tunnel to mourn.

My mom had been extremely sick. She would just lie in bed. She didn’t say much or get out of bed. The only time I ever saw her was when my dad made some soup and said, “Here, honey, give this to your mommy and maybe she will feel better.”

Well, she didn’t get better. Finally, a family friend helped my dad get my mom into the car and drive her to the local hospital. The doctor immediately put her on a helicopter and sent her to Deaconess Hospital in Evansville.

The next several days were a blur. I didn’t care that nobody wanted to play with me or that my teacher didn’t like me. I just sat in the tunnel and thought, Where did Mommy go? Is she ever coming back? My ninth birthday would be in a few days. How could I have a party without my mommy? In class I couldn’t pay attention. I looked out the window, wondering why this strange school only had cornfields outside the classroom.

My little sister, Amy, was only 6 years old but she also knew something was terribly wrong. She and I talked. We decided we had to ask. Hand in hand, we walked into our parents room and said, “Daddy, is Mommy going to die?” Then we heard that awful word: Yes.

Amy said, “Daddy, what does that mean?”

My dad has a master’s degree in theology and had even taken a graduate course in the theology of death and dying, but nothing could have prepared him to look into the face of a 6-year-old and answer that question. He started to cry so hard that we could barely understand him when he said, “It just means that she gets to go to heaven first.”

He wrapped us in his arms and the three of us cried. It seemed like our tears would never stop. Mom had been in a coma eight days by the time he told us this.

On the ninth day Grandma and Grandpa came. I guess they were coming for the funeral. They didn’t go to the hospital that day. They came to the school in the middle of the cornfield. When my grandma came to meet me at my classroom door, I took her hand and walked out of that room full of strangers. I was comforted by her cool, wrinkled hand that connected me somehow to my mommy.

On the 10th day a board member from our church and his wife drove to the hospital in Evansville. As they stopped to pay the toll before crossing the river, the deacon said to the lady in the tollbooth, “Ma’am, do you believe in the power of prayer?” She replied, “I certainly do.” He then asked her if she would pray for his pastor’s wife, who was dying. She asked for my mom’s name. When he told her, the lady in the tollbooth said, “Oh, sir, I am already praying for her.”

The lady in the tollbooth and many other people who had never met my mom were praying. Pastors in our own denomination as well as pastors in the local ministerial alliance asked their congregations to pray. Catholics, Baptists, Methodists, Pentecostals and Presbyterians all offered heartfelt prayers and called their families and friends to ask them to pray for my mom. The lady in the tollbooth had received one of those calls and so she prayed.

On the 11th day, while Amy and I were still in school, my grandparents went to the hospital. While they were in my mom’s room, Mom opened her eyes and said, “It’s my little momma. What are you doing here?”

The 12th day was the day I turned nine. My mother was still in the hospital, but she was off the ventilator and her doctors told us she was going to live. It was the first and only birthday I have ever spent apart from her, but she gave me the best present I have ever received.

On the 14th day she came home. Her battle with pneumonia had left her so weak that she could barely walk from the couch to the bedroom. She could not cook or do laundry or even blow-dry my hair. She had been given so much medicine that she was sometimes confused and could not remember even simple things such as our telephone number. However, she was home and Amy and I could snuggle close to her side again as slowly she got stronger and stronger.

We have stayed at her side for more than eight years now. We’ve been at her side walking on the sand at Virginia Beach. We’ve been at her side as we toured the battlefield at Gettysburg, the museums in Washington, D.C., and the ships at Jamestown. We have camped in a cabin in the mountains of West Virginia. We have been to Niagara Falls and climbed the steps at the Cave of the Winds and sailed by Horseshoe Falls in the Maid of the Mist. We have been trapped in an ice storm and spent Christmas Day in a heated pool covered by a glass dome, watching the snow fall.

More important than the memories of the great trips we have taken are the everyday memories of her helping us with our homework or taking us on shopping trips. What if my mother had not been here to tell me about love and marriage? What if I had missed out on her advice about how to find a husband? (Study hard. Go to college. Find a husband. In the library.) I do not know how many times I have laughed about that little formula. I plan to spend a lot of time at the library.

Who is responsible for her amazing recovery? Some people say it was the great team of doctors who never gave up. Others say that it was the lady in the tollbooth and all of the others in and beyond our new community who prayed. I believe God can use anybody, and everybody, and in this case, I think he did.

Download your FREE ebook, A Prayer for Every Need, by Dr. Norman Vincent Peale

Last year our children, Mike, Kathleen and Bill, Jr., planned a big party for our golden wedding anniversary. “That’s really something to celebrate,” Kathleen said, “50 years together.” Eyes twinkling behind his glasses, my husband added softly, “Good years, too.”

Bill was right about that. When I looked back on the long, happy life we’d had together, though, I started wondering about what lay ahead. Worrying about what might happen to the kids when we weren’t around to look out for them. It’s what mothers do, even when their children are grown.

In my case, there was a real reason: Mike, our oldest, has autism, a neurological disorder that is associated with developmental disabilities, unusual repetitive behaviors and difficulties in social interaction. Back when Mike was growing up, autism was even less understood than it is now. Bill and I could only pray and try to figure things out as we went along.

People with autism often remain locked in their own worlds, so we were grateful we found ways to reach Mike. He worked hard to learn to get along in a world that often didn’t make sense to him. Though he lived with us, he led a fairly independent life. He had a steady job as night-shift custodian at a nearby high school. He managed his own finances, drove his own car. For fun, he liked to read up on area history, then explore the small towns he’d gotten to know from his books.

Despite all his progress, at age 48, Mike remained in many respects as naïve and innocent as a child. We were constantly trying to prepare him for the obstacles he might face, the problems he might run up against. But the ordeal he went through last year was something no one could have planned for.

Late one night, not long after we’d talked about our anniversary party with the kids, a phone call came from the police. Somehow I slept through it, and Bill hadn’t wanted to disturb me. When he filled me in the next morning, the whole thing sounded so bizarre I didn’t believe it at first. Police investigators from Ontario County, an hour’s drive from us, had picked Mike up from work and taken him in for questioning about a bank robbery that happened in their area a week and a half earlier, on Thursday, April 15, at around noon.

“There’s no way Mike could have robbed a bank,” I said, bewildered. “Besides, Thursday’s his day for housecleaning.” Like many autistic people, our son rarely strayed from his routines. “He was here with me, doing his chores.”

“That’s what I tried to tell the police,” Bill said. “They won’t take my word for it, since I wasn’t there with you. They released Mike last night, but they want you to call right away.”

I told the Ontario County police that on April 15, Mike had been home with me until he left for work around 2:30 p.m. When I explained that he could never have committed a bank robbery, the investigator said, “Well, you’re his mother. Of course you’d say that.”

“But it’s true!” I exclaimed. “Mike is not capable of planning and pulling off something that complicated. He’s autistic.” Then, to clarify, I used a term we tried to stay away from. “He’s impaired.”

“I realized that, talking to Mike,” the investigator replied. “Personally I don’t think he did it. But he confessed, so I have to present this to the District Attorney.”

“Confessed?” My mind was reeling. “He was nowhere near that bank!”

“He was in another branch of the bank a week later,” the investigator said. “A teller thought he was acting suspicious and took down his license plate number.”

Then it hit me. Mike had been on vacation last week. He’d spent his time off doing what he loved best—visiting small towns in our area and looking around. He liked to go into banks and get change. Had his autistic quirks been misinterpreted as criminal behavior? I hung up the phone, and prayed, God, let people see Mike for who he is—a good man, a gentle soul.

Later that morning Mike, in his halting way, told Bill and me what had happened with the police. Three officers had shown up where he worked. They read him his rights, handcuffed him and brought him in for questioning.

“Oh, Mike… ” I sighed, my heart aching at how frightened he must have been.

Bill asked, “Why did you confess to something you didn’t do?”

“They kept saying, ‘You know you did it, Mike. I said I didn’t know what they were talking about, and I wanted to go back to work. They said I could, if I told them what they wanted. So I did.”

That was Mike. He just wanted to do what he thought was expected of him. He always tried to please people. Surely the police and the D.A. would see that.

They didn’t. We were told Mike would have to appear in a lineup. We talked to a lawyer, who advised us that it was in Mike’s best interest to cooperate with the authorities. So on a Friday morning three weeks after his interrogation, Mike returned to the Ontario County police station.

Bill and I waited on a bench in the hall while Mike stood in the lineup. Our lawyer came out looking grim. “The teller picked him.”

“She’s wrong!” I nearly shouted. Bill’s arm tightened around me.

That afternoon in the courtroom, the nightmare continued. The judge set Mike’s bail at $50,000 cash or $100,000 bond. Even our lawyer was stunned at the amount.

Police officers handcuffed Mike; standard procedure, they said. I had to stifle a cry. He looked so lost—and scared. God, don’t you see how hard Mike tries? I asked. He believes in you. Why aren’t you protecting him?

“Don’t worry,” Bill told Mike as he was led away to the county jail. “We’ll get you out.”

We had to! Mike wouldn’t be able to handle spending the weekend in jail. The stress of being locked up would send him retreating into that inner world he’d worked so hard to get out of.

Bill and our lawyer made frantic phone calls to try and raise the bail money. I talked to family and friends. “Please pray for Mike,” I asked everyone. “He’s in need of protection, now more than ever.”

Just before five, our broker told us his firm would loan us the money. We rushed to the county jail. Kathleen was waiting for us, looking worried. “I don’t think Mike knows what hit him,” she said. It took a while to get through the red tape, but at last we were able to take Mike home.

The nightmare wasn’t over. Our lawyer warned us, “The case has to go back to the D.A. There may be a grand jury and a trial.” Day after day, every time the phone rang, I jumped, terrified that our lawyer was calling to tell us Mike would have to go back to court, maybe back to jail.

Kathleen tried to get my mind off of it by talking about our anniversary party, coming up in a few weeks. I couldn’t think about what we were going to have for dinner, what I was going to wear. All I could think about was, What will happen to Mike? I didn’t feel like celebrating, but the invitations had gone out, and relatives had already made plans to come in from out of town.

Bill and I went to the park one afternoon to try and relax. We sat by a lake for a while, watching gulls soar overhead. Lord, as these creatures are free, I prayed, keep Mike safe and free. Protect him.

Mike went about his usual routines. He seemed to be handling the whole thing better than Bill and me. God, I know you love Mike as much as we do. I’ll try to trust that love.

One Sunday evening the three of us were sitting in the living room reading. I glanced up from my magazine and noticed Mike, engrossed in a history book. The look of wonderment on his face reminded me of when he was a six-year-old, fascinated by lights. That later led to our first big breakthrough with our son. Bill made up alphabet flashcards, and each time Mike identified a letter correctly, he got to switch on a string of Christmas lights. The “light game” captured Mike’s interest like nothing else we’d tried before. From then on he began to speak, learned to read and write. And pray.

Remembering these and all the other breakthroughs over the years, I felt ashamed that I had ever doubted God. You’ve brought Mike this far, Lord. I know you’ll see him through whatever comes next.

Two days before the party, our lawyer called. “I just heard from the D.A.,” he said. “A man confessed to the April 15th robbery, and a string of others. The charges against Mike will be dismissed.”

“Thank you,” I whispered, overwhelmed. Thank you, God.

That Saturday at our party, Bill and I had much more than our golden anniversary to celebrate.

Mike hasn’t said a lot about the ordeal, but not long ago he told Bill and me, “I still thank God for helping me last year.” I still thank God for helping our son—our whole family—all the years of our lives. I worry a little, like any mother, but in the end, I trust they will be good years, every one of them.

The brindle dog cowered in the back of her kennel, her dark chocolate eyes peering warily up at me. I couldn’t blame her. She’d just arrived here at Denver International Airport after what must have been a terribly disorienting two-week journey all the way from Iraq.

I knelt down and reached my arm out to her, slowly, so I wouldn’t scare her. “It’s okay, Heidi,” I told her. “You know my son, Shawn. I’m going to take care of you until he comes home.”

If he comes home. That fear had preyed on my mind ever since my Shawny deployed to Iraq with the National Guard seven months earlier. Every night he’d been gone, I’d begged God to watch over him and bring him home safely. I missed going out for ice cream and shopping with him, the long talks we’d have. I could always pour my heart out to him.

He’d be the first to admit he’s a mama’s boy. That’s why I was so excited when he called a few weeks earlier. He wasn’t able to call often, so it had to be big news.

Was he coming home? No. He wanted to tell me about Heidi, a stray that his unit had unofficially adopted and Shawn had fallen in love with. His unit was transferring and couldn’t take her with them. The new troops coming in didn’t want the responsibility of caring for a dog. “I have to find her a home, or who knows what will happen to her,” he said. “Can she stay with you for now?”

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Even though I love dogs, and already had a Lab, Sophie, I hesitated to take in a dog I’d never met. But I could tell it meant a lot to Shawn: The cost of sending Heidi home through an organization called Operation Baghdad Pups was two thousand dollars.

Now my husband, Tom, and I were here at the airport, meeting Heidi, even if I wished I were bringing my son home instead. I gently stroked Heidi’s scruffy coat, trying to reassure her. Funny, you know more about Shawn’s life over the last seven months than I do, I thought.

In Shawn’s occasional e-mails and even rarer phone calls he wasn’t allowed to give many details. What was his day like? Was he afraid? Had Heidi comforted him, as I wanted so badly to do?

I coaxed Heidi out of the kennel and clipped a leash to her collar. I took her for a quick walk outside the cargo area before Tom and I got her into the car. Heidi was jittery the whole ride. The shadowy mountains and forests that she saw out the car window as we drove through the Colorado countryside to our small town probably frightened her even more than the plane—she’d never seen any place like it.

Finally we pulled into our driveway. I clipped Heidi’s leash on again and let her sniff around our front yard a little. She was still anxious. “Come on,” I said, leading Heidi into the garage. I hoped that getting her inside and feeding her some dog food or some bacon would settle her a bit.

Suddenly, Heidi jerked the leash. She lowered her head and backed away, so hard that she slipped out of her collar. I grabbed for her, but she turned and ran…right out of the garage. The empty leash and collar dangled in my hand.

Heidi paused at the end of the driveway. She looked back at me, tilting her head as if deciding whether to run off or not. “Get a snack or something,” Tom quietly called. I ran inside and quickly grabbed a slice of bologna from the fridge. But just when we got close, Heidi bolted. I raced after her. She was too fast.

Out of breath, I bent over, hands on my knees, and watched helplessly as her furry form disappeared into the darkness. Tom and I ran up and down our street calling her name. Then our daughter, Sarah, came out to help. She and Tom got into the car and drove around the neighborhood, shouting at the top of their lungs. I stayed home, in case Heidi circled back. But she didn’t.

Tom and Sarah saw no sign of her either. I couldn’t believe it. Heidi hadn’t even set a paw in my house and already I’d lost her. She was used to the desert…how could she navigate our area?

“Let’s look for her again in the morning,” Tom finally said. “It’ll be easier to find her when it’s light out. She can’t have gone too far. She’ll be fine.” I wished I could believe him.

Dear God, I prayed, I know I’ve been praying overtime lately and there are a lot of people in this world who need your help. But please bring this poor dog safely back to us. My son would be so heartbroken if anything happened to her. In a way, my prayer for Shawn became one for Heidi.

First thing in the morning, I searched again. Nothing. Not even a passing jogger had seen her. I came back home and called Operation Baghdad Pups, crying so hard I could barely speak when a woman finally picked up. Somehow, I managed to tell her about losing Heidi.

“You should call your local media,” she said. “Get the community to help.”

I felt a flicker of hope. My neighbor offered to contact some TV stations and newspapers. They were all interested in the story—Soldier’s Rescued Dog Needs Rescuing. My twin sister, Jo, and I drove around town, putting up flyers we’d made with Heidi’s picture. Dozens of people in my town volunteered to help. The search was on.

I dreaded telling Shawn. Heidi had been gone 48 hours when the phone rang, and I just knew it was him. I took a deep breath, but I already felt the tears welling up. “Hi, Shawny,” I said.

He must have heard it in my voice. “What’s wrong, Mama?”

“Oh, Shawn. It’s Heidi. She ran away. I lost her.” I told him about the news stories, the flyers, the neighbors searching for her. “Everyone’s looking but…I don’t know. I’m so sorry…” I broke down.

“It’s okay, Mom. Don’t worry. You’ll find her,” he said, trying to console me. “Listen, tell everyone that she loves blueberry Pop-Tarts.”

“Blueberry Pop-Tarts? I thought bacon…”

“Not a lot of bacon in a Muslim country, Mom,” Shawn said. “But for some reason we’re fully stocked on blueberry Pop-Tarts. She gobbles them right up.”

Only Shawn could make me smile at a time like this. He told me that his tour of duty was nearly over, but I knew that every day he spent in Iraq was another chance he could get hurt…or worse. And now, on top of everything else, he would be worrying about a missing dog too.

I bought a few boxes of blueberry Pop-Tarts and let everyone know about Heidi’s odd food preference. Soon searchers were out trying to lure Heidi with her favorite treat. Even animal control officers baited cages with them.

But a day later, still no Heidi. A reporter from Channel 4 broadcast from our front yard, updating viewers, showing pictures of Heidi and Shawn to urge people to keep looking. Three days had passed already. I feared the worst. I had all but given up. A dog from Iraq, lost in Colorado for so long? We had wolves and coyotes and mountain lions around here. What chance did she have?

The reporter had just finished her segment when the phone rang. Tom answered it. “You just saw Heidi’s picture on the news? She’s in your driveway?” I overheard him say. I snatched up a box of blueberry Pop-Tarts and one of Shawn’s Army hats for a familiar smell. Tom hung up the phone. “They live about eight miles from here,” he said. “Let’s go.”

But by the time we got there, Heidi had run off again. We searched late into the night. No luck. Had Heidi really traveled this far? I couldn’t imagine how scared, hungry and tired she must be. If she was still alive. That night, before I went to bed, I prayed again over Heidi and Shawn. Keep them safe, Lord. Bring them home.

The next morning, Tom and I decided to go back to the neighborhood where she was spotted the night before. We parked our car in front of the tipster’s house.

“Where should we go from here?” I asked Tom.

“Look behind you.”

I turned. Heidi! She was crossing the street and hadn’t noticed us. Thank you, God. We quietly followed her until she came to a chain-link fence. She turned to face us. Please, Lord, don’t let her run.

I sat down near her and slowly unwrapped a Pop-Tart. Heidi licked her chops. She was clearly hungry, but looked all right. I broke off a piece of the pastry and tossed it. She crept closer and wolfed it down. I bet this is how Shawny got you to trust him, I thought.

Soon, she was eating the Pop-Tart out of my hand. I held Shawn’s hat out and she sniffed it. I put my arms around her. “You miss him too,” I said to Heidi, my tears wetting her fur. “I know you do. But he’ll come home to us soon.”

Sometimes all a mother has are her prayers, her trust in the Lord and a blueberry Pop-Tart. I slipped the leash onto Heidi and led her to the car. I couldn’t wait to tell Shawn she was home. Soon, I knew, he’d be home too.

Learn how adopting stray pets helps some soldiers cope and stay positive.

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I’m a nature photographer by profession. I’ve traveled the world and endured every kind of physical hardship to get that perfect shot. I love my work and I’m a perfectionist about it. I am prepared. I once lay still for hours in the sand in Bolivia, ignoring the bees and wasps that crawled up my shirt, just so I could capture a rare butterfly flitting past.

The hardships don’t matter when I look through the lens. Somehow the world makes more sense to me framed by a camera. For one blissful moment everything is composed and in focus. Everything is under control.

Nothing was under control, though, one terrible autumn a few years ago when I got back from an assignment photographing Alaska’s majestic North Slope for National Geographic.

I’d been home in Nebraska a couple months editing photos when, the day before Thanksgiving, my wife, Kathy, discovered the lump in her right breast.

We’d just celebrated our twentieth wedding anniversary. Our two older kids, Cole and Ellen, were still in elementary school. Spencer, our youngest, was barely out of diapers. Within weeks Kathy was bedridden, so weakened by chemo she couldn’t even speak some days. All of a sudden I had a new assignment. I had to take care of Kathy, keep the household going and hide my fears from the kids. It was the exact opposite of being in the field. I had no team of assistants helping me. I was by myself. And I was totally unprepared.

One evening about a month after her cancer diagnosis Kathy was resting in the bedroom and I was in the kitchen cooking dinner. Well, not exactly cooking. I was trying to decipher the microwave directions on a box of Tater Tots.

“Dad, how come Mom’s Tater Tots taste better than yours?” asked nine-year-old Ellen.

“When are you going to help me with my math homework, Dad?” asked Cole, who was 12.

“Tater Tots!” cried two-year-old Spencer from his high chair.

“They’re coming, buddy,” I said.

“I don’t like it when they’re soggy,” said Ellen. “Don’t make them soggy.”

“Tater Tots!”

The microwave beeped and I dished out the meal. “They’re soggy,” proclaimed Ellen.

“I’m sorry, sweetheart. I’m doing my best,” I said.

Cole scribbled at his homework as he ate. I looked at the pile of lunch dishes still unwashed in the sink. Spencer chewed a Tater Tot and frowned.

“I want Mommy,” he said quietly. Ellen nodded in agreement.

Cole looked up. I did my best to keep my voice from cracking.

“I miss Mom too,” I said. “Let’s finish up here and get you to bed, Spencer. Then we can work on that math, Cole.”

Then I remembered. It was bath night. I wouldn’t be joining Kathy in bed for quite a while. When I finally slipped in beside her I couldn’t tell whether she was awake. It was the dead of winter. She was wrapped in blankets, a wool hat pulled tightly over her bald head. She seemed to be murmuring something, maybe talking in her sleep.

I stared at her curled form and tried to remember happier times. We’d met in college at a blues bar. She was so beautiful, so patient and wise.

She still was those things. So different from me! Joel, the guy who never sat still, who hated every moment he wasn’t working. They call people like me Type A personalities. We’re hard to live with sometimes. I felt an intense pang of guilt. For much of our marriage Kathy hadn’t had to live with me. About half of every year I was away on assignment, mostly for National Geographic. Kathy ran the house while I was gone and when I got home, I holed up in my office to edit photos.

Kathy ran everything. I might have changed a diaper or two when our kids were little but I don’t remember. The kids, the house, Kathy—those weren’t my focus for months at a time. Traveling the wild in search of photographs was what I did.

I didn’t quite know how to be a full-time husband or dad. Heck, I didn’t even know how to make Tater Tots! I couldn’t imagine losing Kathy. She was my emotional center even if I rarely slowed down long enough to remember that. “I hope I’m not letting you down,” I whispered. “I feel like I’m flying blind.”

Again I thought I heard her murmur something. I listened closer and realized she was praying. Kathy was a devout Catholic and she’d started praying about her cancer the moment the diagnosis came.

I wasn’t so sure about praying myself, but I knew it comforted her. I caught the words “God” and “heal.” Was that my name she said?

I lay back against the pillows. I suspected it would take more than prayers to see me through this awful time. It was just like I’d told her. I was flying blind. And I was scared.

The next morning was chaotic as usual. Breakfast, getting kids dressed and out the door, making sure everyone had coats and hats and gloves and homework. Then dishes and work around the house.

I found myself longing for the clarity of work in the field. Out there, no matter how rough the terrain or how awful the conditions, I had to concentrate on only one thing: getting the perfect shot.

There was no worry, no guilt, no fear, no uncertainty. Just watching, focusing and activating the shutter.

I would not be in the field again for a long time, though. I’d canceled all assignments for at least the next year to take care of Kathy and the kids. I was lucky to have such a flexible schedule and I simply couldn’t imagine leaving Kathy’s side until she was better.

I just wished I knew what I was doing. I wished the old Joel was somehow better at living this new life. I wished the new Joel was braver. Yet how can you understand a thing like cancer when you are so afraid of it?

Kathy had a doctor’s appointment that morning. I helped her into the car and we started out for the office. Kathy dozed beside me. We came to a stoplight and I looked around at the other cars.

How strange it was to see all those people living normal lives while Kathy and I traveled through the alternate universe of cancer. People chatted on cell phones. A woman peered into her rearview mirror, deftly applying makeup. Someone behind us wolfed down a fast-food breakfast in two bites.

All at once I felt a shock of recognition. Everyone around us was in such a hurry. So rushed they had to put on makeup and eat breakfast at a stoplight. If I’d been on assignment doing a story on modern life, I’d have whipped out my camera and started shooting.

Of course the best shot I could have taken of a harried, overworked, Type A personality was…me. My eyes widened. I was seeing myself in those cars. I wondered, was there any way Joel, the uncompromising photographer, could slow down and be Joel, the supportive husband and father?

I remembered a night out on Alaska’s North Slope, my last assignment before Kathy’s diagnosis, in the town of Kaktovik on the shore of the Beaufort Sea, where the Inupiat people conduct their annual whale hunt.

I was there to photograph polar bears. I waited hours in my rental van until, shrouded in the perpetual twilight of Arctic summer, the bears suddenly appeared, swarming over the shore to feast on the remnants of the hunt.

The bears were bold, even dangerous, sometimes approaching my van to bang on the window. I kept shooting. It was the first time I’d ever seen a polar bear. I felt no fear. I was totally absorbed in my work.

Now, stopped in traffic, I looked at Kathy. I felt a rush of love for her. In that instant I knew. Of course the old Joel could take care of her. In fact, there was no old Joel. There was just Joel. Joel and Kathy. Joel and Kathy and Cole and Ellen and Spencer.

Nothing prevented me from caring for my family with the same patience, fearlessness and commitment I brought to my work. My only mistake had been reserving my best self for the work. I had braved the frigid Arctic and the curiosity of polar bears. I could brave the fear of cancer and the responsibilities of marriage and fatherhood.

It’s been almost six years since Kathy’s oncologist pronounced her cancer-free. She recovered from eight months of chemo and today she’s as active as ever. I’m back working, but life is nothing like it used to be.

I still travel, but now I nearly always have someone with me—Kathy or, even better, Kathy and the kids. They’ve been with me to Moscow, the Galapagos, even Antarctica. On my last assignment, in Mozambique, I took along a new assistant, Cole, who’s 17 now and shooting amazing photos of his own.

I can wield a vacuum and even cook mean Tater Tots. But what really matters is that I’ve learned to slow down, to be patient like a photographer waiting all day and night to get that perfect shot. The shot I’m aiming for these days looks something like this: Kathy and me sitting on our porch in the evening talking about nothing in particular or maybe not talking at all, just watching the light fade, savoring precious time together.

I’m still learning about prayer. And I’ll tell you this. What happened in our family after Kathy’s diagnosis is nothing short of a miracle. We all received the healing we needed. And I learned it’s never too late for a man to start giving his best to the ones he loves the most.

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My husband and I retired from the busy suburbs of Long Island, New York, to the village of Lake Luzerne, 200 miles upstate. We found a church we liked in St. Mary’s Episcopal, but I felt at loose ends. I prayed about it. Back home I’d taught cooking classes for children. Would there be enough interest here?

I asked the rector, Father Bruce Mason, if I could use the church kitchen. “Sure, let’s give it a try,” he said.

Nearly 40 kids signed up, enough for two weekly sessions. First we made monkey bread, cinnamon roll-like bites held together with butter and brown sugar. The kids loved pulling apart the warm bread and popping the sweet sticky pieces into their mouths.

Next up sugar cookies, where they learned to roll out dough. Then mac and cheese from scratch.

By week six they were ready for Swedish meatballs, a recipe with 14 ingredients. The kids carefully followed each step, taking turns cracking the eggs and measuring out spices. Their favorite part was rolling the mixture into balls.

Every session while their dishes cooked, Father Bruce’s wife, Shay, led a Bible study. She taught the kids about foods in the scriptures: honey, pomegranates, olives, grapes, salt and figs. She ended with a prayer. At first the children just listened, but soon they were asking for prayers for family and friends, even saying their own prayers.

At the end of the eight weeks the kids hosted an Italian dinner for the village. More than 130 people attended, feasting on spaghetti and meatballs, garlic bread and sugar cookies for dessert.

I told Father Bruce what a blessing the class had been.

“For weeks I’d been praying for a way to serve the children here,” he said. “But nothing seemed quite right until you came along. I think God knew just the ingredient we were missing.”

Try Magaret’s delicious recipe for Swedish Meatballs.