Random Thoughts Before the Holiday

Today is the day before Thanksgiving and as with most holidays, it’s a mixture of excitement along with a(n) (un)healthy dose of apprehension.

Sam has the day off from work today. As with pretty much every morning, I’ve left breakfast on the table for him. And, pretty much like every morning, I’ll be in touch with hi throughout the morning, checking to make sure everything is going well. I’ve no reason to think things would otherwise, but still, you never know…

If everything goes well, I’ll be picking Rachael up from the bus station later this afternoon. Jake will be heading home for the holiday- either tonight or tomorrow morning. I’m not sure which. And Helaina will be home tomorrow morning, as well. And hopefully, if everything goes well, we’ll spend the day together, enjoying each other’s company

I look forward to Thanksgiving, just as I look forward to Christmas. I look forward to any time the family is able to be together. But until everyone is home, safe, it’s always tinged with an amount of apprehension.

I’m not exactly sure why this is.

I wonder if it might have something to do with Dad and I wonder if it might have something to do with Sam.

A little over twenty years ago, Dad died unexpectedly, just before his fiftieth wedding anniversary. A surprise party had been planned, with invitations for the big event having been sent out to Mom and Dad’s old friends. Needless to say, everything had to be canceled.

I think back to that period of time and how it felt like being on a roller coaster - the car slowly climbing up a long hill in excited anticipation, only to find that the track ended at the top, and the car fell off a cliff.

Just under a year later, Sam’s troubles came suddenly and profoundly to light. All these years later, I still remember it, I still feel it with a unsettling amount of clarity.

What was supposed to be a day filled with joy, a family day of going to the fair, instead ended up being a life-changing day, a day book-ended by hospitals.

The morning began at the local emergency room and by the evening, we found ourselves at the pediatric intensive care unit at a hospital some forty miles away. This was not just the beginning of a two week long hospital stay but, as I could never have guessed at the time, the beginning of a life-long journey.

But you learn from things. Things are fragile. Things are temporary. Things change in a heartbeat. You learn, hopefully, to appreciate the things you have in the moment you have them.

I often wonder how much, if at all, these events play into my life. Would I worry as much as I do about those that I love? Probably. But in the end, the answer doesn’t really matter. These events, like all events, are a part of our lives.

One other story, which I’ve written about before..

When I was much younger, long before the events I mentioned above, long before Sam was even born, I remember a particular warm summer afternoon, standing alone in my living room, looking out at the maple tree in the front yard.

The kids were down for a nap and except for the soft ringing of the wind chimes, all was quiet. I stood before the large living room window, watching as the tree swing drifted gently, almost imperceptibly, side-to-side, over the patch of well-worn earth below it

I remember feeling, suddenly, that I was much older, that I was looking back on this moment as if it were a memory - a memory of a moment long since passed.

And I remember wishing that I could relive this ordinary moment, this ordinary day, just one more time.

This feeling has stayed with me through the years - whether it was fighting off exhaustion so that the kids could go to their socials at their elementary school, or when I was sitting in the cold, drizzling rain, watching any number of after-school sporting events, or when I was sitting in the freezing cold car, late at night, waiting for the team bus to return from an away game - or any number of the seemingly infinite number of moments. It was always, enjoy this moment. It will never come again.

In many ways, that’s what Thanksgiving is for me. That’s what Christmas is for me. That's what any moment is, when we're lucky enough to be together. It’s the chance to enjoy the company of each other - just as we did in the ultimately finite number of "ordinary" moments of years past. And because things are fragile and because things are only temporary - to try and appreciate them in the moment, and to give thanks.