Hi. My name is Aaron Wray Hawkins. I was born in Memphis, Tennessee in 1961, raised in the Mississippi delta until I was a teenager, and have, more than less, live in Madison, Mississippi ever since. I’m a southern boy through and through. I was even schooled at Southern – the University of Southern Mississippi. I met and married the love of my life, Monica, in 1993. We had two of the most precious children you could ask for… and have now buried them both. Kaitlin was born in 1995. We buried her in 2012 after a two year long battle with brain cancer. John Cody was born in 1997 and took his own life on April 13, 2024. We buried him two plots over from his sister, leaving spaces for their mother and me when the time comes for that.
It has been a difficult journey. There are many questions – many unanswered questions. Why did God take our children? Why did God give us our children… only to take them both from us? Why did God take Kaitlin the way that He took her? Why did God not show His strength when John Cody was showing his weakness? I began journaling to John Cody as a way to deal with some of the… difficulties of this journey. It blossomed into something more, and I felt compelled to share it. I am called to open this journal book every morning, hold a pencil in my hand, and read, oft times in amazement, at that which is scribbled down by the pencil in my hand. I take very little credit for what results. That is God! All I do is obey the calling to… hold on to the pencil.