The Walk-Part II

Part 2 of 3 parts. The continuation of The Walk-Part I






The Walk – Part II

It must have been the twenty-eighth of April when Captain Teague called to tell me the time and place Doug and I could meet the arrival of the plane. It had to have been this date, because despite all the noise in my home, with everyone’s cell phone ringing at once, friends and relatives talking in every corner, delivery people bearing flowers too sweet, despite all this commotion and upset, I can still remember sitting there in my bathroom, and out of desperation, ripping off that page of the pink inspirational calendar that constantly had to be re-bent, re-folded—something, anything—to prop it back up on the back of the uninspirational toilet.

The date of this page is the twenty-eighth of April. That day I kept those words close to my heart. Today, these words rest in a small trunk, ornamented in brass and hand-painted in hues of antique white, stenciled with roses. That pink page I take out from time to time gently reminds me:

Let us live in the blessing of Today…
Cherishing our memories, but not holding them too tightly...
Treasuring our dreams, but not building our future on them.
Let us live in the present, rejoicing in the gifts
God lends to every moment of Today.


I called Doug right after Captain Teague and I finished our phone conversation. Then, as I was seated there on the closed lid of the toilet, I gazed up at the white rose wrapped in a layer of waxed paper, its frail color barely faded, its perfume now only imagined. It stands at attention, pressed between two layers of glass. It is a rose separated from the rest of its family. One tiny part of my memories, those blessed memories of mother and son.

This much is all very clear to me.