One of the most difficult things to figure out when writing a story is where to begin. Normally one would say the "beginning," which I suppose would be when I was born, but I will go a few years before that, based on what my parents have shared with me is their story of why I was born in the Philippines in the first place. It was the Summer of 1985 and Betty Beckwith and Allan Johnson were both enrolled in classes at the Summer Institute of Linguistics, that summer held in Seattle, Washington. Allan had gone to the Navy right out of high school and was in the Nuclear Reactor Program for six years. Following that, he enrolled at the University of Washington and studied electrical engineering. UW had a satellite program in his hometown of Richland, so he could live at home and work on his degree. The summer he went to SIL he was still finishing his engineering program but wanting to check out linguistics and Bible translation to see if that was a direction the Lord might be leading him to go. Betty, on the other hand, had been out of school for awhile. After high school she went straight to college, enrolling at Biola University in La Mirada, CA, where she got a degree in Music Education and a minor in Bible. Her first teaching job took her to a little town in the middle of nowhere in Oregon, because there were no music teaching jobs in California. After teaching there she was in time able to get a teaching job in Southern California and moved back home - she grew up in the city of Highland Park, CA, in Los Angeles. She felt that God was calling her to be a Bible translator, so she went to the SIL summer training school so she could follow that call. The first day, in the cafeteria, they met. Betty had already been through the line when she saw this young kid, Allan, come in, and showed him how the cafeteria system worked. They sat together and talked. Betty remembers thinking, "man, they're letting kids into this program younger and younger!" She said that she thought Allan looked about 18. (she was... a little bit older than that.) Just trying to be nice to this kid she had met, she recalls telling him, "Well, you never know, maybe you'll meet your wife here." When re-telling the story now, my dad sometimes adds with a twinkle in his eye, "yeah, you!" They became friends that summer and would get together to study for classes. Allan was really detail oriented and was really great with the linguistics stuff. He and Betty went to the park one day on their bikes and he brought his autoharp with him, which he played for her. He always enjoyed writing songs and accompanying them with his instrument.
At the end of the Summer as they were saying goodbye, Allan asked Betty if they could write letters to keep in touch. Betty said, "sure," thinking that long distance was a bad idea, but if Allan wrote letters she would certainly write back, and she did. In the course of a few months, they became really close through their lengthy letters. Betty received a telegram one day that said, "marry me?" and she replied by telegram "yes." Allan visited Betty and her family at Thanksgiving and gave her the ring by opening the prize package from a cracker jack box carefully and resealing it with the ring inside. Betty almost let the kids open the prize, but Allan insisted that she should be the one.
The following summer, 1986, both Allan and Betty returned to the Summer Institute of Linguistics, this time held in Oregon, this time engaged. They got married at the end of summer on August 30, 1986. Ten months later, my older sister Becky was born, at the beginning of a third SIL school. After that they went to field training in Mexico, then left for the Philippines on June 11, 1989. In December 1989 there was a coup attempt on Malacanang Palace and they could hear planes overhead dropping bombs. It wasn't safe for them to go outside, so our house helper, Ate Nini would go to the palengke for them and bring back food. A few months later, March 11, 1990, nine months after my family arrived in the Philippines, I was born breech. I have always said it was because I wanted to hit the ground running, but funny enough, I did not walk early.
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