DALLAS — This content is sponsored by Sam Pack Auto Group.
Jo Henry remembers one moment from childhood that taught her everything she needed to know about her mother.
“We were in Tuesday Morning in Garland and this lady commented on my mother’s pearls,” Jo recalled. “And my mom just gave them to her.”
Jo said that’s a perfect description of who Pamela Evans is.
Pamela dropped out of school at a young age to help care for her siblings and cousins, her daughter said.
And through the years, she’s opened her home to people who had nowhere else to go.
“To total strangers,” Jo said. “And not asking for anything [in return] when she didn’t have anything herself.”
A few years ago, Jo underwent open heart surgery and she believes she would not have survived the physical and financial toll without her mother’s help.
“I lost everything. Single mom, three kids, and my mom, in this little two-bedroom shack was like, come stay with us,” Jo said.
“We stayed here for two years until I got back on my feet and of course it was a struggle, but my mama never complained.”
The last few months have added to the struggle: Pamela’s stove and oven went out. So did the window unit air conditioner that cools her home. And, her refrigerator broke.
She scraped together money to fix the fridge, but that meant no extra money for her favorite passion: planting flowers.
Jo nominated her mother for a Little Wish and Pamela’s wish is being granted.
Sam Pack Auto Group is giving Pamela a new window unit, a new stove and oven, a patio set, a home treadmill, and a $500 Walmart gift card.
Pamela’s reaction to the news was a mixture of tears, laughter, and screams.
“Oh my goodness!” she kept saying.
“That’s not a Little Wish,” Pamela said. “That’s a big wish!”
Jo cried and laughed alongside her mother, who said being chosen reminded her there is still goodness in the world.
“Sometimes the struggle is so difficult, it just steals your hope sometimes,” Pamela said. “I’ve tried to instill in my children not to quit. Never, never quit. It doesn’t matter how hard it is, find joy in some place.”
She said she chooses to focus on the promise of the future.
“There’s always tomorrow and it will be brighter,” she said.
Jo said seeing her mother’s reaction reminded her of how good it feels to give, a lesson she knows her mother first taught her long ago.
“I always dreamed as a kid - I wanted to give my mama the world. If I could hit the lottery and just set her up somewhere, I would!”
A Little Wish isn’t a lottery win, but it sure did make a brighter tomorrow.