Over the last few months I helped a neighbor edit a book she’s self-publishing. It’s titled “Swan Songs: An Inspirational Journey.” It’s her swan song too. She has inoperable lung cancer. I spent today helping her finish the text of a children’s book, also about swans. In it, an evil sea dragon captures Mr. Swan’s family and holds them hostage until Swan Angel helps rescue them.
Did any of you read in the newspaper about the swans that disappeared from a Fort Walton Beach waterway and ended up in some guy’s bird sanctuary in Destin? This woman, Tami Kerr, was the one who found the swans and worked with PAWS to get them relocated to Crestview. After that I heard nothing else. Turns out Crestview’s waters were just as dangerous. Another brood of cygnets disappeared and the adults were losing weight to the point of starvation.
Tami, while getting more and more sick, worked tirelessly to find a safe home for the swans down in Lakeland. The swans are now cared for on their own lake by the Regal Swan Foundation. The adult pair finally had some babies survive.
Tami will not survive much longer. Her medical bills have devastated finances so her and her husband expect to be evicted from their foreclosed home soon. Her brother is in the process of setting up a corporation to carry on with her book, after which it will be available from lulu.com or Amazon. She may never see a print copy. So what do any of us have to complain about?
