The Gift…

On January 17, 2013, I lost my father to a long illness that changed the dynamic of our family, less than a month before that I inadvertently received a most precious gift.

It was December 24, 2012, when my husband, kids and I were at Christmas Eve service, my mom texted that they were running late, and she was worried there wouldn’t be room in the always crowded church. I assured her that we could squeeze and said I’d meet her in the parking lot to help get dad out of the car. His health was rapidly declining, and the air was frigid, moments later we had unloaded him in record time and raced into the building as the service was just beginning. I pushed him to the end of the now overflowing row where my family was seated and set the brakes on his wheelchair. Upon realizing there was room for only one more on the pew mom told me to sit while she took a seat with a friend across the aisle.

You see the gift was from my mother, that I was able to sit with my father on his last Christmas, to hold his shaky hand, to lay my head on his shoulder, to study his face knowing and yet not, that I would never have this moment again. When I think back to that day waves of guilt wash over me, while my mother was giving me a treasured memory, I was stealing a moment from her that she could never get back.

At the end of the service with the lights off, we held candles while singing “Silent Night”. In the soft glow I watched his crystal blue eyes tear up, I listened to his raspy voice sing the words and when I looked past him, I saw my mother watching us, smiling with tears of her own. These people that gave me life and helped me become the woman I am today also taught me that the love of family and making memories is more important than anything else.

This week Sean Dietrich ended his podcast with the story of “Silent Night”, as he sang the familiar words, I found myself uncontrollably sobbing as the vision of that night played in my head. My father taught me many things but creating “quality family time dadgumnit” is possibly my favorite, and that memory? An unspeakable gift from the most unselfish woman.