A 4th Course of Chicken Soup for the Soul

  The memory brought tears to my eyes. Now, close to the Oklahoma state line, I happened to see the sign "Oklahoma Trading Post50 Miles AheadExit 287." It occurred to me that Bob and I always meant to stop on our return trips from his family reunions in Florida, but we never did. We had already gassed up an exit or two before, we were tired, we just wanted to get home. "This time," I decided, "I'm going to stop."

  As I drove, my mind wandered; how could I ever make it without Bobmy big, strong husband whose comforting arms held me when I cried, whose sense of humor melted my anger, and whose sense of adventure enriched both our lives. Tears stained my cheeks, but I kept driving. Suddenly, there was exit 287. Damn! I had passed the Trading Post. Well, maybe next time.

  Just as suddenly as I made the decision to drive on, I decided I would go back! I swerved the car at the last instant and drove up the ramp. Reaching the main road, I realized I was on the Turner Turnpikeno exits for who knew how many miles. I looked for a flat place in the median and drove across, mindless of whether a state trooper might be watching, and headed back toward the Trading Post.

  Page 182

  As expected, the Trading Post was like many Bob and I stopped at on our travels: a mixture of Southwestern goods and souvenirs. As I wandered through the store, I came upon a wrought-iron and wooden bed setup showcasing Indian blankets, prickly cactus plants and strings of red and green peppers.

  Beside the bed was a small table holding Aztec vases, delicate desert flowers and a howling coyote with a bright scarf around its neck. Unobtrusively nestled among them sat a small, old-timey wooden telephone with a carved mouthpiece and rotary dial, its receiver resting on the black prong and connected with a thin black cord. My first thought was, "How unusual. Everything else is so Southwestern, the telephone looks out of place." Picking it up, I lifted the receiver.

  A musical tinkling began from the base of the phone. Tears filled my eyes and coursed down my cheeks. A wave of warmth swept over me as I stood sobbing, clutching the phone, oblivious of other customers walking warily around me. The tune I heard was "I Just Called to Say I Love You."

  Making my way toward the front to pay for my newfound treasure, there was no doubt now that I could make it. I was not alone; my Bob had just called to say he loved me.

  Judy Walker

  Page 183

  You Don't Bring Me Flowers, Anymore

  Pain and suffering is inevitable, being miserable is optional.

  Art Clanin

  The elderly caretaker of a peaceful lonely cemetery received a check every month from a woman, an invalid in a hospital in a nearby city. The check was to buy fresh flowers for the grave of her son, who had been killed in an automobile accident a couple of years before.

  One day a car drove into the cemetery and stopped in front of the caretaker's ivy-covered administration building. A man was driving the car. In the back seat sat an elderly lady, pale as death, her eyes half-closed.

  "The lady is too ill to walk," the driver told the caretaker. "Would you mind coming with us to her son's graveshe has a favor to ask of you. You see, she is dying, and she has asked me, as an old family friend, to bring her out here for one last look at her son's grave."

  "Is this Mrs. Wilson?" the caretaker asked.

  The man nodded.

  Page 184

  "Yes, I know who she is. She's the one who has been sending me a check every month to put flowers on her son's grave." The caretaker followed the man to the car and got in beside the woman. She was frail and obviously near death. But there was something else about her face, the caretaker notedthe eyes dark and sullen, hiding some deep, long-lasting hurt.

  "I am Mrs. Wilson," she whispered. "Every month for the past two years"

  "Yes, I know. I have attended to it, just as you asked."

  "I have come here today," she went on, "because the doctors tell me I have only a few weeks left. I shall not be sorry to go. There is nothing left to live for. But before I die, I wanted to come here for one last look and to make arrangements with you to keep on placing the flowers on my son's grave."

  She seemed exhaustedthe effort to speak sapping her strength. The car made its way down a narrow, gravel road to the grave. When they reached the grave, the woman, with what appeared to be great effort, raised herself slightly and gazed out the window at her son's tombstone. There was no sound during the moments that followedonly the chirping of the birds in the tall, old trees scattered among the graves.

  Finally, the caretaker spoke. "You know, Ma'am, I was always sorry you kept sending the money for the flowers."

  The woman seemed at first not to hear. Then slowly she turned toward him. "Sorry?" she whispered. "Do you realize what you are sayingmy son . . . "

  "Yes, I know," he said gently. "But, you see, I belong to a church group that every week visits hospitals, asylums, prisons. There are live people in those places who need cheering up, and most of them love flowersthey can see them and smell them. That grave" he said, "over there

  Page 185

  there's no one living, no one to see and smell the beauty of the flowers . . . " he looked away, his voice trailing off.

  The woman did not answer, but just kept staring at the grave of her son. After what seemed like hours, she lifted her hand and the man drove them back to the caretaker's building. He got out and without a word they drove off. I've offended her, he thought. I shouldn't have said what I did.

  Some months later, however, he was astonished to have another visit from the woman. This time there was no driver. She was driving the car herself! The caretaker could hardly believe his eyes.

  "You were right," she told him, "about the flowers. That's why there have been no more checks. After I got back to the hospital, I couldn't get your words out of my mind. So I started buying flowers for the others in the hospital who didn't have any. It gave me such a feeling of joy to see how much they enjoyed themand from a total stranger. It made them happy, but more than that, it made me happy.

  "The doctors don't know," she went on, "what is suddenly making me well, but I do!"

  Bits & Pieces

  Page 186

  The Grave No One Tended

  The day was lovely as I strolled along

  peering at stones on the way,

  And that's when I saw it, that pitiful cross

  that looked splintered and faded away.

  With flowers in hand to tend Father's grave,

  I knew I must hurry along.

  But I couldn't help but linger awhile

  at that cross that just didn't belong.

  The date on the front confirmed my suspicions

  of what already I knew.

  A child lay beneath that horrible cross

  and its faded color of blue.

  What selfish parents they must have been

  to bury their child all alone,

  Without flowers or candles to light the night

  and not even a simple headstone.

  Page 187

  I looked even closer at that awful cross

  that was nearly splintered away,

  And there on the back, I read the words

  that changed me forever that day.

  ''This cross isn't grand, but it was carved by my hands

  so you'll know, son, how much I care.

  It's the color of blue to remind me of you

  and how painful it is I'm not there,

  That it's you who is gone and it's me living on

  while your young life has come to an end.

  And I'm left alone, never again with a home

  and a grave that's too painful to tend."

  Tears stung my eyes as I looked all around

  at the monuments that ragged cross put to shame.

  And I shared with those parents their horrible loss

  that brought them such terrible pain.

  And all the tombstones, some even taller than me

  suddenly seemed small in a way,

  Next to that litt
le handmade cross, carved with such love

  and the flowers I planted that day.

  Cheryl L. Costelto-Forshey

  Page 188

  Out of the Night

  If winter comes, can spring be far behind?

  Percy Bysshe Shelley

  After the funeral of my 12-year-old son, Shane, who was killed in a skiing accident, I returned to my home in Stillwater, Minnesota, broken in a way I had never been broken before. For weeks, months, I went through the motions of life. I walked around, I breathed air, but I wasn't participating. My heart and soul weren't present. People praised me for my courage, but I knew better. I wasn't facing my loss; I was merely enduring it.

  Little by little, however, a new rhythm emerged in my relationship with Scotty, the closest thing to a childhood sweetheart I'd ever had. One evening, Scott was idly flicking the TV remote control, when he suddenly stopped at a special about birds.

  The little bird they featured was scraggly and had lost most of his feathers, but I was taken by his sweet, intelligent personality.

  I turned to Scotty. "I want a bird."

  Page 189

  At the pet store the next day, I found myself looking at the parrots.

  "If you're going to get a parrot," Scotty told me, "get an African Gray."

  He went on to praise this breed of parrot. Vocabulary of hundreds of words. Bonded with their owners.

  "Look at this," he said, pointing to an article in a bird magazine. It detailed how one African Gray, when left at the vet's, turned to its owner and said, "Please don't leave me." That's when I knew I wanted one.

  The African Gray wasn't an easy breed to find, but a friend in California sent me one for my birthday. I picked her up at the airport. Her name was Max.

  I peered into the cage. She was gray, the size of a pigeon, with red tail feathers.

  She looked at me.

  "Well?" she said.

  But soon after arriving in Minnesota, Max got sick. I was terrified she was going to die. Already she'd brought so much joy into my life. From the start she imitated my laugh, and I was surprised how much I was laughing.

  When I took her to the vet, the doctor assured me Max would be fine. She asked me how I handled the bird. "Carefully," I said. If I picked her up, I wore oven mitts. It took hours to get her back in her cage.

  "It's not the bird I'm worried about," the doctor said. "It's you. That bird is dominating you. She knows you're scared of her. You've got to take charge."

  I took a deep breath. "I'm no bird expert," I said, "but from what I've read, this bird has 300 pounds of pressure in her beak."

  The vet said yes.

  "So, in one sweep, she could take my finger off. Is that right?"

  The vet said yes.

  Page 190

  "And you want me to stand up to her?"

  The vet said yes.

  I took Max home, put on my oven mitts, and put her back in her cage. Then I went to my bedroom and watched two videos I had watched over and over the past two years.

  The first was the basketball game I attended with Shane the morning of his accident. One mother had taped her son, and she'd sent me a copy.

  The second was a video of Shane's funeral. I had known I was too overwhelmed to register much of what happened, so I asked someone to film it.

  I watched the basketball game. Shane looked so vital, so full of life. Then I watched the funeral clips, ending with hundreds of balloons soaring up into the sky. Shane always loved balloons, and whenever he lost one, I comforted him by saying that God catches all your lost balloons so that first thing when you get to heaven, you get a big bouquet of them.

  No wonder I've been so stunned, I thought. We went from a basketball game to a funeral in a matter of days. As I sat there, I sensed God watching me. For the first time since Shane's death two years before, I sensed that this presence was watching me with love.

  And then I wondered if life wasn't like the bird. You might know full well what it could do to you. But sometimes you've got to square your shoulders, get in its face and stand up to it anyway.

  I walked over to Max's cage, opened the door and stuck my hand in. She climbed on and looked at me.

  "Hello," she said.

  Melody Beattie

  Page 191

  The Donor

  Signs from the soul come silently, as silently as the sun enters the darkened world.

  Tibetan Saying

  My grown daughter, Sara, and I were very good friends. She lived with her family in a nearby town which allowed us to see each other very often. In between visits we wrote or talked on the phone.

  When she called me, she always said, "Hi, Mom, it's me," and I'd say, "Hi, Me, how are you today?" She often signed her letters simply, "Me." Sometimes I'd call her ''Me" just to tease.

  Then my poor Sara died suddenly, without warning, from a brain hemorrhage. Needless to say, I was devastated! There can be no worse pain for a parent than to lose a beloved child. It took all my considerable faith to keep going.

  We decided to donate her organs so at least that much good could come from such an otherwise tragic situation. In due time, I heard from the Organ Retrieval Group telling me where all her organs went. No names were mentioned, of course.

  Page 192

  About one year later, I received a beautiful letter from the young man who received her pancreas and kidney. What a difference it made in his life!

  Praise God! And since he couldn't use his own name, guess how he signed his letter: "Me"!

  My cup runneth over.

  Mary M. Jelinek

  Page 193

  Red Jell-O at Dawn

  Family means sharing inadequacies, imperfections and feelings with each other and still loving each other. But even when you set out to love, you may not always be a likable person. And when you're not perfect, forgiveness for yourself and others becomes important. Then you get up the next day and start again. It is a process, like the opening of a bud. It is a flowering, a blooming and blossoming.

  Bernie Siegel

  When my youngest child, Andrew, was 11 years old, he asked if we could have a "ceremony" at the lake to commemorate the second anniversary of his dad's death. I didn't know what to think. He not only wanted us to watch the sunrise in silence at the shore of Lake Michigan, he also insisted that we eat red cherry Jell-O with bananas in it while we sat in the sand.

  "Jell-O? At six in the morning?" I asked incredulously.

  "Mom, red Jell-O with bananas was Dad's favorite snack. We always made it together when I visited him on weekends."

  Page 194

  I still had hurt feelings that Harold filed for divorce two months into our agreed-upon year-long separation without any effort at marriage counseling. And I was especially hurt that he remarried the day our divorce was final. When he died two years later, I helped Andrew through the grieving process while trying to ignore my own feelings. Now we had to bring it all up again?

  "Andrew, it's supposed to be really cold tomorrow. Couldn't you just think about your dad at home?"