This fact was impressed on me when I read something out of Lee Iacocca's autobiography. He wrote some touching words. He says, "All through my career at Ford and later at Chrysler, my wife, Mary, was my greatest fan and cheerleader. We were very close, and she was always at my side." It took enormous courage on her part to be there, he said, because she had diabetes, and her condition was aggravated by stress.

When Iacocca was fired from the presidency of Ford, and was offered the job of saving Chrysler, his wife's reaction was, "I love you, and know you can do anything you set your mind to." She ignored the toll it would take on her. Iacocca noted that on each of the occasions when her health failed her, it was following a period of great stress at Ford or at Chrysler.

He continues: "One evening two weeks before her death, Mary called me in Toronto to tell me how proud she was of me...." This encouragement meant a lot to Iococca. Later he would say, "Mary sustained me." But he also makes this sad confession: "Yet during those last few difficult years, I never once told her how proud I was of her." Here was one of the most successful men of our time confessing his failure to thank the person who held his life together during his greatest crisis.

I hope none of us will take for granted our spouses and cheerleaders.

God of cheerleaders, guide me in not taking my cheerleader for granted. Amen.

Ron Newhouse