THE HOPE ROCK by: Adrian Hall McCloud

The “Hope” Rock

For most people, it looks like just a rock, but to some including myself it is a constant reminder. People struggle everyday with life issues, and the rock representing HOPE helps to see light at the end of any dark tunnel. I have been thru many difficult things in my 27 years of Life and I can honestly say without HOPE, I probably would not have overcome them. My mother was diagnosed with Stage 4 colon cancer when I was nineteen years old. She had been sick nearly a year and a half before the doctors and myself, had lost the one thing that was keeping us positive… Hope. Not long after the doctor’s prognosis, my mother and her sister took a trip to New Mexico, as a “last resort”. There was a place that was considered to be a “Holy town”. My mother bought everything from “Holy dirt” to “Holy water”. However, it wasn’t until a drive on a small road that a complete stranger would not only change my mother’s life, but mine as well.

My mother and her sister came across a group of people who were all running for different causes. My aunt told my mother that the next person she saw, she would donate twenty dollars and ask them to run for my mothers cancer. They drove several miles before they saw anyone, and then a man came along. A man who was covered in tattoos riding a bike. My aunt asked the man if he would ride for my mother’s cancer, and he said that he would be honored to, and that he was also running for his wife. As he offered to ride for my mother, he pulled a small rock out of his fanny pack, he handed it to her through the window, he told her to keep it. It was a simple rock with the word HOPE written across it, the rock was outlined with five small dots. “Each dot represents each time my wife has had brain surgery for her cancer, and I want you to have it” he said. Then, my mother with tears in her eyes, a smile on her face and Hope in her heart and just a small simple rock placed in her hand, watched as this complete stranger rode off on his bike.

I could tell there was something different about my mother when she returned home. She was okay with living OR dying. She now had HOPE, she understood that everything happened for a reason, and in the end, everything would be okay.

My mother passed away just two months short of my 21st birthday. I was angry, sad, depressed, and confused. These feelings continued for months and I took it out on everyone around me, I resorted to pills to make me a ‘happier’ person or to help me cope with my mother’s death. Then one day, I found the HOPE rock in and old gym bag. The rock couldn’t have reappeared at a better time, because without that little reminder who knows what road I may of ended up going down.

Now I choose a different way of coping with the death of my mom, while helping others going through difficult times themselves. I spend a lot of time to making HOPE rocks so others can have that small reminder to always have hope, EVERYONE could use it, we need it to have something to look forward to, something to aim for, a reminder that we can get through everyday life. I started giving these rocks to people suffering from cancer and their families, but I soon realized that there are so many people out in this World who could use HOPE for completely different reasons. Each Hope rock is different, but they all have the same meaning. I have gained so much from a complete stranger whom I’ve never seen, and will probably never meet. A simple rock from a small town in New Mexico brought my mother hope and helped me get through some of the hardest times of my life. Who knows what a simple Hope rock could do for another complete stranger.

I put the initials J.C. on the back of every single rock I paint memory of my mother Jerry Cox, and the initials of- quite possibly… someone else.

Whomever it may be to end up with a HOPE rock, cherish it. Use it as a small reminder whenever your down, or going through hard times, and then maybe one day, you’ll meet a stranger who may need it more than you, and then it will be your turn, your turn to spread HOPE. It changed the way I live my life, then and now. Just a rock… with a very important word.
HOPE.

In Memory of Jerry Cox
Always Have Hope