Hope That Changed the World: The Rachel Leebay Story

By Randy Verticchio

Hope That Changed the World is the story of a young woman, Rachel Leebay, and how her life would have been different had she chosen to carry her child to term. The child was a little girl that Rachel would have named Hope. Hopes life would have caused a positive domino effect that would change Rachel, her family, and our entire country and world.

Discover how one life can have an immeasurable impact on our world.

Read Hope That Changed the World.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Balboa Press
• Release date: Jun 29, 2015
• ISBN: 9781504334709

Randy Verticchio

Randy Verticchio is a retired educator who taught high school math and was a building level administrator for a total of thirty-five years. Randy worked in six Illinois school districts in Wapella, Farmington, Mt. Sterling, Rock Island, Jacksonville, and Elgin. Randy currently lives with his wife, Diana, in Jacksonville and they have two grown daughters, Jaclyn and Abby. Randy has been active in the pro-life movement for over twenty years. This is Randy’s first novel.

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Copyright © 2015 Randy Verticchio.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the publisher except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

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Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

The author of this book does not dispense medical advice or prescribe the use of any technique as a form of treatment for physical, emotional, or medical problems without the advice of a physician, either directly or indirectly. The intent of the author is only to offer information of a general nature to help you in your quest for emotional and spiritual well-being. In the event you use any of the information in this book for yourself, which is your constitutional right, the author and the publisher assume no responsibility for your actions.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

ISBN: 978-1-5043-3469-3 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-5043-3471-6 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-5043-3470-9 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2015909266

Balboa Press rev. date: 6/29/2015

Contents

Prologue

Preface

Acknowledgements

Chronological dates in Rachel’ Leebay’s two lives

Part I

Chapter 1     The Wednesday before Thanksgiving

Chapter 2     River Bend Pub

Chapter 3     Thanksgiving Day

Chapter 4     Black Friday

Chapter 5     Friday Night

Chapter 6     June 1990

Chapter 7     Linda Knows Best

Chapter 8     Weighing the Options

Chapter 9     Delivering the News

Chapter 10   Searching for a Friend

Chapter 11   Distracting Activities

Chapter 12   Trip to Planned Parenthood

Chapter 13   A Medical Procedure

Chapter 14   Independence Day

Chapter 15   Ben Learns the News

Chapter 16   School Begins

Chapter 17   Every Tues. Morning / 6:30 – 7:20 AM

Chapter 18   Halloween

Chapter 19   Thanksgiving 1990

Chapter 20   Decision to Move

Chapter 21   Carlinville, IL

Chapter 22   Tom Bray … A good man

Chapter 23   Starting a Family

Chapter 24   Adoption / A Different Way of Accepting a Gift from God

Chapter 25   Home Visit … March ’01

Chapter 26   9-11-01

Chapter 27   Trip to New York

Part I

Chapter 28   A Different Decision in July ’90

Chapter 29   Grandma Bev

Chapter 30   A Father Should to be Involved

Chapter 31   Telling the School Community

Chapter 32   Rudy’s Tacos

Chapter 33   Parent Meeting

Chapter 34   Ben Uses the L word

Chapter 35   As if They were Never Apart

Chapter 36   Rachel Names Her Daughter

Chapter 37   Hope’s Birth

Chapter 38   Ben Bonds with Hope

Chapter 39   Ben’s Annulment

Chapter 40   Down Payment on a Home in Bettendorf

Chapter 41   A Question of Faith

Chapter 42   Rachel Converts / Becomes a Catholic

Chapter 43   The Pro-Life Movement

Chapter 44   Hope’s 1st Birthday (10/12/91)

Chapter 45   A lack of Discipline on the BHS Football Team

Chapter 46   Ben and Rachel are Married 10/12/93

Chapter 47   Bingo with Grandma Martin

Chapter 48   Ben applies for Head Coach Position at BHS

Chapter 49   Ben Starts Law School at Univ. of Iowa

Chapter 50   Hope’s 1st Grade Parent/ Teacher Conference

Chapter 51   Keeping the Flame Hot

Chapter 52   Working for the Gore Campaign

Chapter 53   The Butterfly Ballot

Chapter 54   Ben is Assigned to Work with FBI Counter Terrorism Unit

Chapter 55   Ben Shares His Concerns about a Group of Middle Eastern Men

Chapter 56   American Freedom Award

The End / Reader’s choice

Prologue

HOPE THAT CHANGED THE WORLD

The premise of this book is the reverse of Frank Capra’s It’s a Wonderful Life, as the story line in Capra’s tale is that through interactions with an angel George Bailey learns what the world would have been like without him, if he had never been born. My story is about a young women, Rachel Leebay, who has an abortion and lives in our complex world at the end of the 20th century; in a dream Rachel learns what the world could have been like if she had kept and raised her child. A little girl she would have named HOPE. She sees how her life and all of our lives would have been different due to the positive ‘domino effect’ Hope would have had on our world.

Find out how

Everything is better with a little bit of Hope.

Enjoy reading: Hope that Changed the World.

Preface

My intent in writing this fictional story of how Hope Grogan impacts the lives of everyone around her, particularly her mother, Rachel Leebay Grogan, and father, Ben Grogan; was to create an interesting story that has the reading asking, "What if".

- What if we no longer had abortion on demand for young women in the United States? How would the addition of all those lives, ended prematurely by abortion, change our country and the world?

- What if we had a culture in the USA that supported young women in trouble from an unplanned pregnancy, and they were treated as heroes for keeping the child to term? These young women taking extra care for this developing human life in womb would be doing a service to our culture by making adoption an alternative path to parenthood for young couple struggling to have children.

- What if all the religions and cultures of the world would come together to support LIFE?

- What if 9-11 had never occurred and we had used the billions of dollars spent on war to re-building our intra-structure, schools, and social programs?

- What if this nation had taken the time to explore potential threats and mediate PEACE; rather than just react to violent acts with more violence? (The military industrial industry complex quietly promotes our aggressive, violent reactions as it is the life-blood of their multi-trillion dollar industry. For them, Peace would cause serious hardship.)

One thing for certain, the world would change dramatically if the US would reverse the Roe vs. Wade decision and demonstrate respect for human life. Any culture would experience significant change when you add all those lives to their population; as you would be adding artists, engineers, scientists, lawyers, doctors, teachers, electricians, men and women of the cloth, motivational speaker, and writers. Then quite naturally you would also be adding some drug dealers, thieves, and prostitutes. You would be adding a plethora of human beings to the melting pot we call the United States.

My story focuses on the life of one aborted fetus and how she (Hope Marie Grogan) would have made a HUGE difference in the world had her mother chosen LIFE. I hope you enjoy reading the story of Rachel Leebay and how her daughter Hope changed the world around her in ways big and small. The domino effect that any one life has on a culture is almost immeasurable, but the effect 50 million lives would have is a topic beyond my ability to put into print or perhaps even comprehend. The lives of our aborted children would certainly change our world, and perhaps make us a kinder culture.

I certainly believe that I was guided to write this book as a way to provide a voice to my PRO-Life beliefs. Rachel Leebay’s questions: If at any stage of pregnancy the fetus is not a human being in its earliest stages of development; then tell me what is it? What else could it possibly be, other than a human being? These questions are in fact, my questions. Questions that have haunted my mind for decades, as I cannot perceive how anyone does not realize that human life begins in womb. We were all once a 5-month old developing fetus in womb, and we should all thank GOD our mothers chose LIFE.

I trust you will enjoy reading … HOPE that Changed the World

Personal e-mail: [e-mail]

Blog: rverticchiospeaks.com

Acknowledgements

There are several people I need to acknowledge who assisted me in taking this project to completion:

• The HOLY SPIRIT … that is where the idea originated

• My wife / Diana … on-going encouragement

• My two daughters / Jaclyn & Abby …. editing

• Dale Morrissey … major revision early in project

• Mark Geninatti …. Proof reading

• Tom Verticchio … editing

• Jayne Cioni … encouragement

• Mark Verticchio … Belief in the Idea

• Jono Verticcho … photo of Carlinville Square

• Paige Eilering … photos of Augie & Adolph’s

• Ann Wildrick …. Belief that this book could sell…. (We will see?)

• Carmi Cioni … sketch of 2nd plane on 9-11

Chronological dates in Rachel’ Leebay’s two lives

Mario and Marie Brollino

(Rachel’s maternal grandparents) pass thru Ellis Island >>> 09/20/22

Rachel Leebay’s DOB >>> 9/20/65

(parents were Bev and Jim Leebay .. Rachel was their only child, Bev would marry twice more / in 1990 she was Mrs. Bev Martin)

Ben Grogan’s DOB >>> 8/14/62

Ben and Shelley Winford wedding on June 27th, 1987

Ben and Rachel meet on Wed. 11/22/89

Hope’s Gift date … conception … 01/14/90

Image1.jpg

Only one of these 2 sets of events is possible

** Abortion and 9-11 attacks

or

•   Domino Effect / Hope’s birth Changed the World

Chapter 1

THE WEDNESDAY BEFORE THANKSGIVING

Twenty-four year old Rachel Leebay leans over her desk in exhaustion, as she stares out at her now empty 3rd grade classroom. Rachel is an attractive five foot- six inch young women with auburn hair and a dynamic smile that lights up the room when she engages in the love of her life; teaching. Just twenty minutes earlier, the room was buzzing with activity as she attempted to lead her class of anxious eight and nine year olds through their Thanksgiving art project, a family scrapbook.

Rachel, are you going to Library Guild? asked a gruff voice from the hallway. The voice was that of Linda Molton, Rachel’s teaching partner. Linda had been in teaching for sixteen years, the last fourteen at Eugene Field Elementary School. Linda found her niche in third grade and had guided Rachel through her first year and half of teaching with a balance of motherly love and cold-hard reality. She had taught Rachel that though her youthful enthusiasm was wonderful; teaching is a marathon and you must pace yourself and take time for yourself by finding some stress relief with colleagues on occasion.

I don’t know, these kids have worn me out in just three days this week and I need to spend some time this weekend working on a paper due for my graduate class, explained Rachel.

Come on with us, I’ve told you before all work and no play is a sure way to have a short career in teaching, Linda said, only half teasing.

OK, I will meet you down by the lounge in five minutes; let me clean up the paints from our art project, replied Rachel.

Alright, but don’t be longer than that as there will be all those young football coaches coming this afternoon as they held a big clinic at the high school and I happen to know they are all scheduled to be at the Guild by 4:30; and one of them may want to wear me out, Linda said in a sassy tone.

Ms. Milton, what if your students heard you talking like that?

Hey, it’s Thanksgiving Break girl and I’m not their mother on holidays: and just because I’m divorced doesn’t mean I can’t have an interest in a little romance. said Linda. See you downstairs in five minutes, don’t be late.

Rachel gathered up the paint brushes, the art containers and put her rolls of butcher block paper in the art cabinet; she threw her planner and the first draft of her master’s essay in her carry-all bag and locked her door. Rachel knew she would need to come to school on Friday or Saturday and spend a few hours getting ready for the Monday when her twenty-eight students would return after the long Thanksgiving weekend.

Downstairs, Linda was talking to colleagues about how she was going to start her four-day Thanksgiving weekend by picking out one of these young football coaches and teaching them what a mature divorcee knows about relationships.

Well, are you gals ready or not? asked Rachel as she jogged down the stairs as only a twenty-four year old with good knees can.

They all headed out to the parking lot, leaving the building empty of the teachers, a rare occurrence for there to be no teachers working past 5:00 pm on a Wednesday.

OK, I’ll drive one car and Rachel is coming with me as she has volunteered to be my DD if things go well, says Linda with a big grin and a little chuckle.

The three other staff members each wanted to take their own car as they planned on heading home after one adult beverage, as they had work to do to prepare for Thanksgiving the next day.

Chapter 2

RIVER BEND PUB

Image2.jpg

What the Eugene Fields staff affectionately refers to as the Library Guild is actually a local pub downtown Moline called, The River Bend Pub, and it has been a popular teacher’s hangout since its opening day in 1984. The Bend offered free hors d’oeuvres for teachers from 4:00 – 7:00 pm on Fridays and days before a holiday.

Rachel recalls stopping in The Bend when she was a student at Augie on the night before Thanksgiving as her sorority would make this an annual all night reunion. Friends from different universities would be coming home for Thanksgiving and the Bend was an ideal place to get together.

The Bend was full by 4:40 pm when the Rachel and Linda entered and looked around for a table; Rachel spotted her colleagues from Fields at a high stool table towards the