| Sunny Side Up Jan. 29, 2003 � 2003, Kathleen Gibson Passing on the family faith It�s a family tradition. Every February my seventy-nine-year-old father calls from his particularly sunny corner of B.C. �Mowed the lawn today,� he says. He knows how I love to hear that. Waist high snowbanks lurk beside our driveway. I sigh. �That�s nice, Dad. How many mosquito bites did�ya get?� �Mosquitoes? Haven�t seen one of those since I left Saskatchewan in �51.� Then he roars. Me too. It�s part of the tradition. Sometimes he adds something like, �The tulips on the west side of the house are almost finished blooming now.� I expect that call soon. I spent twenty-three years in B.C.�s lower mainland. But between four provinces, I�ve passed as many winters in deep freeze. I�d really miss the white and silver, were I to move back. But every now and then I fill my father�s ears with complaints about the shoveling required to manage it. The last month has been no exception. A parcel arrived the other day. From my father. I opened it curiously. Nestled between duck-printed tissue lay a sweatshirt, decorated with a lovely snow scene. The card read: �Congratulations, Kathleen! Here is your prize for being nominated the best female snow shoveling artist in all the county of Mossfield. Presented to you by none other than the President and Personal Manager of the Green Grass Mowing Association, located in the heart of Elliot county of B.C. Wear it with pride. Love Dad. P.S. For more information contact me on the WEB at com.ncme.� Dad doesn�t write often. I held that note in my hand a long time. Then I tried on the sweatshirt. Perfect fit. When I called to thank him, he told me, with a little pride, that he�d chosen it himself. �Mailed it all by my lonesome too,� he boasted. Lonesome is right. My eighty-three year old mother has been hospitalized after weeks of debilitating, seemingly undiagnosable pain. These are perplexing times in �Elliot county�. Only the night before, Dad�he of irrepressible spirit, and unconquerable faith�told me over the phone how hard it is to keep from just sitting down and having a good bawl�all the day long. The sweatshirt warms me as I write. I picture Dad, shopping, just looking for a reason to keep putting one step in front of the other, one hope ahead of yesterday�s tired one. And chewing his pen over that subtle invitation to �com.nc� him. This morning a few words leaped off their page in the Psalms and landed squarely in my heart. �Surely I have a delightful inheritance,� they said, referring to the richness God gives his children. I thought of one smallish man who for my whole life has demonstrated that faith includes looking for laughter in mid-winter. That God hears our cries of protest against winter�s heaviest burdens. And that spring always follows even the longest, coldest season. My fathers, heavenly and earthly, have both given me a delightful inheritance. Faith and hope. It�s a family tradition. You can email responses to [email protected] |