First Spirit Daughter

By: Lolo Anderson

This may be the most deeply personal story so far. It is about my most secrete hell God, brought me through at the end of my first marriage. I never intended to ever talk about Pam to anyone. Now that private hell is over for me. God has blessed me with His peace and forgiveness. Now God has blessed me with the truth that everything did work out for the good of all concerned, even me.

This has been the second time writing about a dark subject in my life that has turned it all around into a bright and sweet memory to keep instead. Simply writing about Pam reminded me of my love for her. Now the little girl in the center of my break up with first wife is not a dark memory anymore.

After racking my fading brain, I have come up with loads of good and wonderful things about Pam I want to remember. I feel it is now so important because of how fast important things are slipping away from me now. Last week’s hit hard with discovery of Cindy, my beautiful step daughter for about 7 years. Wow, if I could forget not just her name but her. I thought I better write about Pam before she is gone to.

To all my family and friends, Pam was the reason for my break-up with my first wife. Nothing could be farther from the truth. I have always been proud of my relationship with Pam and so look forward to a holy embrace when we both get to heaven. God has always been in the center of our love for each other and He is pleased with our love.

We were both innocent victims of Satan and I was put into such a deep dark place that until now I did not want to write about Pam. I have recently been reminded of Cindy, my legal step daughter of about 7 years, that I nearly forgot. I know it is time to write about my darkest time in my life before any more details are gone forever. So, here goes my letter to Pam’s spirit, just so I can remember her.

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Hello Pam,

I wanted to write you a letter to tell you how much God loves you. From the moment you ran into my arms as a child, I have loved you. I don’t remember how old you were now, maybe Kindergarten or 1st grade. Your mommy and daddy had just been killed in a private airplane crash in Ukiah. You had moved into your aunt Karen’s house next door.

I know now that it was God that drove me to resign my dream job and house overlooking the Monterey Bay in Santa Cruz. Just so me and Phyllis could be there for you and your 2 sisters. You and your sisters spent every day with my two kids, Richard and Michelle in our house. The holy Spirit dwelled in that house on West Street in Fort Bragg.

All that moving and moving for so many years with General construction PG&E. This was my very first house I ever purchased in my life. It was built by reverend Alton Sandel’s own hands out of scrape redwood from the sawmill. He was also my loving pastor at Bethel Baptist Church on Willits Road. God had blessed him with a great new big house and he sold me that house for $20,000. I had no money to put down and he carried the note himself.

Now Rev Sandel was a very emotional heart grabbing southern Baptist preacher. He would pray and cry aloud for nearly his whole sermons from his knees on the platform. So was his blessing on His house he had built to serve the Lord. Into a house built with God’s actual physical love, I moved my family of 2 kids and a very sweet first wife and 2 dogs. Soon tragedy struck our two new friends from next door across the street. Your aunt Karen’s sister and husband were killed in an accident and she took in her sister’s 3 little girls. All you kids were all about the same age. Two weeks after you moved next door another tragedy struck your Aunt Karen. Her brother-in-law blew her other sister’s brains all over the wall in front of her 2 small children.

Aunt Karen already had a boy about the same age as my son and a girl a little older than your sister. Then came you and your 2 sisters and 2 weeks later came another 2 cousins. My house was the neighborhood play central. Across the street there was a foster home with another 2 or 3 kids that you all played with like one big family. It was a perfect giant loving family environment at a very hard time for you 5 orphans. The rev Sandel would drop by and just sit and cry with all of God’s love in his old house.

My wife Phyllis was just the wonderful and most perfect mommy to you and all the kids. Cooking all your favorite foods and sewing rips in your dresses. Playing with her 2 basset hounds like dolls dressing them up. Doing her very best to be the mommy all of you were missing. I was doing my best to be the loving daddy missing for all of you,

Not unusual to have a half dozen kids laying on the floor watching TV. Most of the hurting little babies wanted to curl up next to Phyllis on the couch. Not you. I can still see the image of you curled up on my lap with your head against my neck. That old recliner sitting in front of the wood burning Ashley heater that reverend Sandel had made just for us.

I still remember you hugging me around my neck and me hugging you right back when something sad was on the movie. I remember crying so many times with you when we talked about heaven and how I believed what your mommy and daddy were doing right then. I know God put me there just for you during those years. We were your aunt and Uncle’s very best friends. Okay, not just me. He put both me and my first wife there for all you kids.

I remember waking up a few times sleeping on the recliner with you after falling asleep watching a movie. My wife would just cover us up with a blanket and check on any other kids sleeping on the couch. All the kids had nightmares even you did. You always came to me for my love and comfort back in those days.

It was not every night you guys got to sleep over but your last 2 little cousins were about all your aunt Karen could deal with sometimes. Your aunt knew me and Phyllis loved you kids and you were safe in our house next door whenever you stayed with us.

I think you kids watched every Disney movie we had at the time in our front room. Most of them I watched with you curled up on my lap in that old recliner. I remember telling stories to the all the kids and sometime I would tell them just to you alone. You were especially interested in my stories about heaven and what I believe about the bible.

I know I could never replace your real daddy but for a long time at a very important time for you, I was your spiritual daddy. I loved being your daddy and your sisters to, but mostly yours. The sweet innocence in a little orphans’ eyes when she really believed the words coming out of my mouth was Gods way to give her comfort. I felt I was truly a conduit for God’s love to you, my child. Thinking now of the joy of our relationship with that peace from God gives me such great joy and thanks to God for sending you to me.

Thinking about those years you lived next door to me. This has blessed my soul in such a way that the rest of the story is now so trivial. My love for all 5 of you orphans exposed me to the joy and peace from the Holy Father when walking in His will and serving his broken babies.

You were the first in a long line of spiritual daughters that will sit at my table in heaven. Just like you, most of them only needed me for a short while and then you were all gone away from me. God has granted me memory of those years right after your mom and dad was killed. Just when I was down and thinking low thoughts about myself.

It gives me pride in myself that God thought so high of me to be the one sent to comfort you in the time of your greatest need as a child. Not once but twice. Years later when you were about 16 and kicked out of your third foster home. God sent you to me for a second time to protect you and give you a safe home to live with me and Phyllis.

The things they say about us has hurt me beyond understanding before writing this letter. Now I see the true lasting value is remembering how I shared God’s love to you and how proud I feel now when I think of you. Because of you I still believe the most hated animal in the world is a troubled teenage girl. No one in their right mind would ever want such an animal living in their home.

I believe God placed me there for you to curl up to and cry in my arms, missing your mommy and daddy. I also believe He put me there for you for a shelter in a very hard time in your life. I am so happy and proud that God seen fit to use me in that way for you and all the young girls that followed after you.

I am proud to have been your daddy when you needed a daddy as a little girl. I am also proud to have been your loving Christian counselor when you were a troubled teenager. Because of you I became a youth counselor in a Christian Youth group in Napa. It was because we had been so close for so many years as a child, that you were able to open up to me. You were able to tell your loving daddy about your deep secrete hurting and feelings about each horrible thing that had been happening to you.

The most blessed years of my life was those years working so close with so many teenagers in Napa and even later back home in Fort Bragg. I think of all the teenagers after you that God brought to me for His shelter and love. Unfortunately, there were all to many other girls that were suffering from some of the same things you went through. Your openness of your feelings to me played a large part in my ability to relate to many other young girls in trouble.

I never communicated with you until now after they took you away from me. What happened to me after that was all in God’s plan to prepare me. I hiked way back into the mountains and fasted for days. I asked God to forgive me for walking so far away from Him. I repented my sins and He forgave me and a great heavy weight was lifted off my shoulders.

I prayed to God and read and then re-read James over and over. God spoke to me in those words to give me faith to trust Him to protect me from the evil one. Since that time, I was never afraid of what anyone would ever say about my relationship with you or anyone I was asked to give shelter to. I returned home a month later expecting legal trouble with the boldness that could have only come from God.

For the next several years I trusted God to protect me from the evil one’s arrows. Any one of dozens of young girls could tell the same type of lie that broke up my family. The reward for trusting you and many others has been so awesome. This led to my work with the Christian Youth Group in Napa that may not ever have been without you in my life.

Not just the experience you gave to me helped create the ability to relate to many other’s problems. It was also the sinful path I had been traveling since you lived next door to me on West Street. The sex, drugs and alcohol after turning 30 gave me another dark insight to help kids suffering from Satan’s temptations.

The most shocking event of all was the abortion I allowed my wife to have back in the 70’s. That I was party to killing my very own third child and the guilt I carried for that. So many of His little baby girls had to make that same decision under my care. If only one frightened little child saved only one of His tiny babies it was worth it all.

God’s reward for me for trusting Him and serving His orphans and widows like in my favorite verses in James continues to this day. For example, after I had expelled all my energy in His service there in Napa, then He gave me a second family. He also gave me a second son to love and watch grow into a man all over again.

I don’t need to know if I had done any good for you or not. When things were really hard you knew who to run to for shelter. You trusted my pure love for you enough then, that is how I know you still trust and love my spirit and I still do yours.

Now your memory is bright and warm to my soul. As I prepare to meet my Lord, it is comforting to me to know He knows all about my love for you. He has already taken all the bad things I have done and tossed them into the sea. Now he is still blessing me with the thought of looking in His eyes when I get to heaven and both of us be thinking about you and so many others because of you.

I have enjoyed writing to you. It has been very pleasant and comforting to remind myself just how deep and rich my life has been with His Holy Spirit. I pray for your protection from the Evil one and like all my children I pray for your happiness.

Looking back now I would do it all again. Even knowing it would bring an end to my most precious possession, my first family. I could not have lived with my self if I would have played it safe and not open my home to you in when you needed a safe place to stay. Everyone said you were nothing but trouble. A wild and crazy abused teenage girl, but my reward for trusting you has been so amazing.

I only had a very small part in your life but I am so proud of the role God gave me to play in it. I found the true value in love is the price you have to pay for it. Loosing my beloved family was proof that my trust in God’s love for me was worth everything. You opened the door that let me trust God to protect me and allow myself to open my heart and home up to several troubled teenage girls for years.

Now instead of lamenting the loss of my perfect family, I see now all the good that has come out of all this pain. Because of my love for you I learned to trust God to protect His servant when walking in His will. You were my first borne into my spiritual family. I have a vision of all my spiritual daughters at a table in heaven someday. My memory is fading now I can only remember a few names but because of you my table will be full of daughters that God blessed me with in my life.

How do I know this? Because the memory of you and all my spiritual daughters has been such blessing to remember here on earth. How much more precious the reward will be in heaven where nothing is hidden.

Now for the real reason for writing you this letter. Until only recently just the thought of you would only bring up the darkest days of my life when I broke up with Phyllis. I have experienced a wonderful thing called forgiveness, that has changed all of that dark memory. That is my message to you, my little sweetheart. Please find the peace in your heart if you can forgive all the bad things that have happened to you.

What happened between Phyllis and me was not your fault. We were two different people between the house on West Street and the Pine Beach house. We had wondered far away from the path after West Street. If I had not allowed us to get so far away from God, Satan would not have been able to destroy my home.

I have found my forgiveness to Phyllis for the lies that were told about us. More than that she has forgiven me for allowing us to be so far from God that she thought that was possible. If you feel to blame yourself for anything, you started me on a journey following God, working with so many other teenagers for years.

In closing my hope is by reading this letter to your spirit, you will know how much God loves you. If a sinful old man can still love you all these years later, just think how much Gods thinks about you and loves you all the more.

Your Uncle Bob