A
Good Heart
By Susan Law Corpany
His name is Walter
Tavares, but his friends call him “Waltah
Boy.” He was the football coach for the
defensive backs when my stepson, Aaron, played
football at Konawaena High School. He was the
kind of coach who knew what was going on with
his players.
In addition to his
coaching, he is also a talented recording artist.
He is also actively involved in the Kona Faith
Center and worked as a missionary in Mexico. Probably
the best way to describe him is “a guy with
a good heart.” The problem is that apparently
he doesn’t have a good heart, physically
speaking.
An article July 3
in our local newspaper, West Hawaii Today,
details his recent health struggles. On May 2,
he underwent heart surgery to replace a defective
mitral valve. Although the surgery was a success,
complications arose, and he was flown back to
the hospital. There he had to undergo another
surgery after his heart stopped three times in
one week. He is now in critical condition and
has also developed kidney problems.
An Answer
to a Prayer
He has played an
important role in many lives, especially those
of his wife and three children. I’m sure
that many of the students he has touched, those
who have enjoyed his music, and those who have
been helped by his ministry are praying for him.
The story about him in the paper would touch me
even if I had never met him. Come to think of
it I have never met him, but he has blessed my
family, and I have heard enough about him that
I feel as if I know him.
It says in the article
that he stepped up to bat four years ago when
the boys’ basketball coach walked out just
days before the team’s first game. (How
was that for a mixed metaphor?) But his involvement
with our family is much more personal. While he
was my stepson’s coach, Aaron’s mother
was terminally ill with leukemia. According to
my husband, Thom, Waltah Boy reached out to Aaron
with a spiritual maturity well beyond his years,
even though at the time he was still in his 30s.
Walter’s faith and cheerful attitude sustained
Aaron through a football season while his parents
were across the ocean in Seattle preparing for
a bone marrow transplant.
Because both of Aaron’s
older siblings, Becky and Rob, were serving missions
in South America, it was in answer to the prayers
of worried parents that the Lord provided support
in the form of Waltah Boy for Aaron as he watched
out for his two younger brothers and helped Grandma
take care of things at home.
At a concert during
a trip back to the island, Thom heard Waltah Boy
sing a song called “Don’t Take the
Girl.” Not a big country music fan, Thom
had never heard this song before, popularized
by country singer, Tim McGraw. Facing the possibility
of soon losing his wife, Thom was moved by the
song that starts out as a story about a young
man who doesn’t want the girl next door
tagging along, and he pleads “Don’t
Take the Girl” when she wants to go fishing
with them. Eventually however, he falls in love
with her.
During a robbery
attempt, he again pleads “don’t take
the girl,” willing to hand over anything
he has of worth to save her. They get married
and have a child. Complications arise and the
doctor tells him she might not make it. His final
plea of “Don’t Take the Girl”
is a prayer to God for her healing.
Waltah Boy sang the
song, at Thom’s request, at Aaron’s
mother’s funeral.
