Anderson column: True karma will come back to get you

Published 4:30 am Saturday, May 15, 2021

The word karma was never intended to be used as a bad thing, but over the years, we hear terms like “karma will come around to get them” used often.

The origins of karma meant a good deed would lead to something that would benefit you in the future. And yes, it also meant if you did something bad it would come back to bite you.

I couldn’t help thinking about this as the stories flowed from our pages the past week.

Elva Estrada quietly did things to help others in Tyler. Her day job the past 15 years has been working as a commercial lender and branch manager at Southside Bank.

She was working to raise money for PATH to help others get ahead in life.

No matter how quiet you do things as a parent, someone is always paying attention.

Your kids.

Selena Estrada, 8, saw mom was trying to raise money and realized it was going to take more than a lemonade stand to help out. So she asked if she could sell her dresses, which were different party dresses for kids ages 1 to 7.

The money went toward the $33,000 raised for PATH this week as the fundraiser concluded.

Karma came around the right way.

I had a chance to visit with Kevin Aguilar this week. He is a Winnsboro native who went to Harmony and trains at Longview MMA as part of Team 515. He wanted to play professional football but was told he was too small. He wanted to be a professional mixed martial arts fighter as well, but he was forced into working, not dreaming.

So when he left work making signs, he trained. And trained. One day in the noisy shop he got the call, he was invited to complete in a UFC fight card in Las Vegas. He punched out for the final time at the sign shop and punched in, literally, at his new job as a fighter.

Tonight, he is fighting again in front of the world, a UFC event in Houston that sold out in minutes.

He was told “you can’t” as a kid. Today, he is training kids in his spare time to tell them “you can.”

Karma came around the right way.

Chris and Lindsay Cochran were high school sweethearts at Hallsville and they are still living the youthful life as Chris is the football coach at Lindale.

They wanted to have kids and it wasn’t working out.

Instead of complaining, they kept their faith and devotion.

The family went to nonprofit ministry Christian Homes and Family Services and wanted to adopt.

Because of their positive outlook, a pregnant woman chose the Cochrans as the parents on April 1, 2019. She was Black. The Cochrans are white and they did not care. They had their son.

When the child was born, the birth mom held her son, Coby, for a moment and then said, “He’s not mine, he’s yours.”

They accepted not only bringing a Black child into their lives, but acknowledged there would be race issues going forward. Chris admitted it changed their perspective on racial issues.

With Coby Cochran in attendance, dad led Lindale to the best season in school history, right to the Texas state championship game in Dallas at AT&T Stadium.

Karma came around the right way.

When it comes to helping others, Courtney Shelton can’t say no.

She spent a career working long hours as a nurse, and worked her way up at CHRISTUS Trinity Mother Frances Hospital in Tyler. She sees a lot of people at their worst before operations with a goal to see them at their best.

While visiting her mom in May of 2020, she was heading home when her mom called because she left her purse in the car. Courtney smiled and turned around, bringing the purse back. As she got back on the road heading to Tyler, he daughters asked her for a request they never ask, “Take Interstate 20 because there is internet connection for their phones.”

Courtney smiled and got on the road.

Her daughter, Kylie, is 14. Usually a 14-year-old would have their head buried in the phone thanks to having internet connection. However, at the moment, something made her want to sit up and visit with her mom.

There was a motorcycle accident and Courtney did not see it. Kylie saw the motorcycle disappear into the median but she certainly saw a man get thrown in the air. She demanded her mom stop, she knew what she saw even if no one else saw it.

Courtney does not say no when it comes to helping others. With vehicles coming by at 70 to 80 miles per hour, she pulled over.

She found John Zumbro laying in the tall grass. John was later told by doctors if he had moved his head to the left or right, he may have died. His best case scenario would have been total paralysis.

Had she not stopped, no one would have checked that area for John or the motorcycle. The grass was almost 3-feet high and there were no signs of an accident.

A year passed and the hospital honored Courtney with the first-ever CHRISTUS Good Samaritan Award. As she accepted the award, John Zumbro walked in the back of the room right to the podium and hugged her. The sound of hundreds of people standing up and applauding wiped out the sound of crying and tears.

Karma came around the right way.

There are more of these stories to tell in our region and I’m looking forward to sharing them. Just keep the faith. What you are doing today will pay off tomorrow.

(John Anderson is editor of the Tyler Morning Telegraph. He can be reached at janderson@tylerpaper.com)