Twenty-one years ago today, I gave birth to my first child, a son.  It was one of the two happiest days of my life, the second being the birth of my second, a daughter.  I don’t know what I did to deserve these two kids, but know that I am grateful.

My son was born sixteen years to the day Mark Stebbins, the first victim of the OCCKs was abducted.   I would not put this together this for decades.   I do know I didn’t save the newspaper from the day he was born, because the huge headline was something having to do with Jeffrey Dahmer.  When I realized my son was born on the day Mark Stebbins was abducted—after I moved back to the Midwest in 2005 and started taking another look at these murders–I was humbled.

When my firstborn was young, on occasion, my Dad would refer to my son as Tim.  It broke my heart.  Once, when my little family visited my parents, my young son saw the paintings of Tim (I never hid what happened from my kids) and he said something along the lines of  “I don’t know what I would do if someone did that to my little sister.”

On a much happier note, my best friend from college just posted on my FB page and said “Do you remember being pregnant with [your son] when we vacationed at Red Fish Lake Lodge?”  We hiked to 10,000 feet, had a lot of laughs, there was an amazing view, and a few short months later we all welcomed my son to the world.  So in spite of all of the sadness and horror of 1976-1977, lots of good prevailed.  So there.