My thoughts on a page.

Do you believe in miracles? Neither did I but then one Christmas two years ago this happened. It was the first Christmas after my friends young boy lost his fight against leukemia. I can tell you, that unlike some of the slightly exaggerated tales I tell here of my everyday life, this is a true story, one I still cannot figure out. I wrote about it in this post called,  ‘Miracle or coincidence?’  If you’ve not read it before I’ll leave you make your own mind up. If you have I hope you’ll agree, it’s a good Christmas story written Christmas 2013.

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Christmas Eve is such a wonderful day when you have children.
It is full of excitement and great anticipation of that very special visitor calling later.

From early morning my youngest had acted like the town crier, “One more day”, was her mantra.
All the presents were wrapped and under the tree.
Much feeling and guessing had gone on, with some feelers assuring us they definitely knew what was inside.

The house had been tidied to a degree rarely seen, so much so my daughter remarked “the last time the house looked like this was when Nana was coming to stay”.

The turkey was awaiting stuffing, the desserts were made and the ham steeping.
All systems go.

As Christmas songs blasted out on the radio, there was a great buzz all around the house.
However for a time I felt detached.

My mind couldn’t help but wander back to this day last year. My young friend was just out of hospital, having been diagnosed with leukemia a few weeks earlier. He’d begun chemo, had his first bone marrow biopsy and spent the first of many weeks in hospital. He was not yet very sick, and still had a full head of hair.

My mind continued to wander through the year, despite my best efforts to think of something else. Not wanting to lessen the happy mood in the house I decided to go upstairs and take the five minutes I needed, to think of my young friend and to mourn his loss.

When I returned to the mayhem of the kitchen my husband looked at me oddly. I thought it was out of concern, wondering if I was upset. He began to say something but stopped.
“What?”, I asked. “Well, he said reluctantly,  holding out a Christmas card, I just found this sitting her by the sink, I don’t know where it came from?”
I opened it. It was the Christmas card my young buddy had given me last year.
“Happy Christmas,
Thank you for all your help”.

I have no idea where it came from. I had stood by that sink many the hour and never noticed it. I could have wondered how? Why? what the blazes?
But the timing was perfect.

Unknown to us, Daniel’s Mum and Dad were minutes away from calling to our house. As we sat together and wondered how it was they were facing a Christmas without their young boy I handed them the card I’d been given just a short while before, a simple Christmas card, hand written by their own son. I told them the strange tale of how we had just found it, in one of the most used areas of the kitchen.

As they looked at it I knew, that whether it was sent by Daniel or not, it was perfect. The words might have been meant for me last year, but as they read them it was as if he were speaking to them both,  ‘Happy Christmas, Thank you for all your help’.

Who knows maybe he was?

 

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photo credit: Trash the Dress Lauren Fix via photopin (license)