Minor Miracles

I have never come to a firm conclusion on major miracles.  However, I am a strong believer in minor ones.  They have been an important and integral part of my life  Let me tell you about one that happened sometime ago.

My Mother gave me some extraordinary gifts - a diamond and sapphire bracelet given to her by my Father in the early days of their courtship, her wedding china, and a gorgeous Mink jacket.  However, most holidays, birthdays or anniversaries, she preferred to send a check, usually in August with a handwritten note - telling me to buy something for the holidays.

Of course, it's been years since I received either a note or a phone call, and I miss them more than the checks or gifts.

Last night, however, I remembered the most wonderful gift she ever gave me.

From the time of my early childhood I had a small sepia snapshot of my Dad, it was apparently taken in the late 1920's - years before his marriage or my birth.  The young man stands facing the camera confident in his youth and future.  He wears a battered fedora and holds a baseball bat.    He has no fear; he owns the world.  The gentleness I remember so well is there, but the most striking image is the hope and confidence in his eyes.  He is young; he is happy, and one day he would be my Father.

World War I was now a memory - he had traveled across the sea safely wearing his sailor's uniform proudly - and now this young man from the streets of NYC probably had some great stories of his time in France.  Perhaps he radiated his happiness because of the beautiful dark haired girl who took the picture.  Oh, they had some family problems, but time would help solve them.  His business seemed to be flourishing. People liked him, and of course, he loved the world and all its inhabitants. The passage of time never dimmed that.

I always remember having this picture.  I cannot recall not owning it. When Dad left our world, I wanted to give my Mother something to let her know how deeply I felt her pain; how much I shared her sorrow.  While she and I loved each other, our communication was never the best.

I had the picture restored and set into a small circular brass frame.  For some unknown reason I felt it must belong to her.  I would give her this memory of him.  I had no other copy, other than the fragmented original pieces returned by the photographer.  The picture was now my Mother's.  It belonged to her.  A souvenir of their youth and early love.

Several years later I regretted not having a copy made, and searched for the battered original, and of course, was unable to find it.

Still I knew it belonged on her dressing stand where I always saw it when I visited.

Then suddenly my Mother died.  The family problems the young man had in his future were as complicated now as they were in the early days of their marriage.

Time had never solved them.

And really, they are not important enough to record.  However, my Mother's belongings were not distributed among her three children.  And that, too, didn't really matter.  They were, after all, just things.

One thing I did want, and I wanted badly.  The picture, and it was denied me, and again, I said it didn't matter.  But it did.  More than I admitted even to myself.

Then a fortnight before the remainder of my Mother's estate would be distributed, mostly to strangers, I was looking for an address.  An annoying leak had sprung up under the kitchen sink.  A plumber had to be located immediately.

As I rummaged through the worn pages of a tattered telephone directory, I discovered a crisp white envelope nestled in the dog-eared pages.  Tossing it into the pile of things to be discarded, something fluttered to the floor.............the faded original of Dad's picture.  A final gift from my Mother who had gone to join him exactly two weeks earlier.