Brief Thoughts from Bren: In Her Memory

By Bren Dubay
November 2023

It was not uncommon to look up and see them riding their bicycles. They were heading to Koinonia’s Picnic Hill. Sometimes, the Secret Service struggled to keep up with them. Maybe the Agents were just being kind.

Once, she was shopping at Koinonia’s Welcome Center, and when she started for the restroom, I apologized for the mess in the computer common area she’d have to pass through – new flooring was being installed.

“I’m not bothered by your floor,” she said.

“Yes, m’am. I’m just concerned about the clutter. I wouldn’t want you to trip, and hurt yourself.”

She took my hand and squeezed it, “You’re so kind. I’ll be fine.”

Kind.

One of the Koinonians, Elizabeth, was serving at Harvest of Hope, the County’s food pantry. So was she. They began to talk. Elizabeth’s parents had recently moved from Florida into the Sumter Retirement Community in Plains.

“You are next-door neighbors,” Elizabeth beamed.

“We sure are,” she said.

She asked Elizabeth her parents’ names and their apartment number and wrote them down.

“Jimmy and I will visit them.”

And they did. Elizabeth’s mom has since passed away. Her father will soon turn 92 and now suffers from dementia, but he remembers that day.

“There was a knock. I opened the door, and there they were: the President and the First Lady. We had a lovely conversation.”

Kind. Lovely. Real. Rosalynn Carter.

We often pray at Koinonia to be good and decent people. 

We haven’t had to look very far to see an example of “good and decent.”

President and Mrs. Carter at Koinonia in 2019 to commemorate the 10th anniversary of Millard Fuller’s death.