The Gift

The wind shrieked with a soul of its own as if it was coming for someone. The rain pelted the old pane glass windows as hard as ice crystals. The cabin, built by her grandfather, was the only shelter against the late autumn tempest. Lillian Grace’s father was out there somewhere trying to get back home. Lillian was an only child left to be raised by her father alone from birth. Her birthday was her father’s most joyous and painful day of his life since his wife, of two years, slipped beyond this land to the next giving him this the gift of Lillan. Her father was a country doctor who was called away for one emergency after another on a regular basis. Tonight was no different. Another family had a sick child and it ‘seemed’ that her Father was all that stood between another tragic death out in the wilderness and another day to live.

The flickering candlelight sat on the one table in front of her. The flame was dancing in unison with the fireplace which was all that lit the small front room, as Lillian sat waiting in front of the rattling window, wrapped in a large patchwork quilt her mother had sewed some 17 years ago… all she could do was pray.

She would often remember her father’s words.

“Honey, we aren’t here to possess as much as we are here to give away. The more a man accumulates the more burdened down he becomes. It’s the rare man who knows how to truly give.”

She often wondered, on these frequent nights alone, if this was how her father gave? So often ‘give’ is defined as ‘giving something away: life food, or money’. They didn’t have much of that, but they always had enough. He would often be offered gifts that he just turned away from. One time, someone offered him his own buggy to pull behind his horse. Her father turned them down flat out. “I aint got no need for such things, but thank ye much,” and off he would go as if he didn’t even notice the gift that was offered.

It was hard for Lillian to understand him sometimes. It would be so easy and so nice for him to be out of the rain, heat, wind or snow when riding, but it was just one of many things about her father that she didn’t understand. It seemed the less she understood at times, the more she respected him.

Every hour on the hour Lillian would pick up her father’s old pocket watch, wind it a ½ turn, check the time, stoke the fire, then rewrap herself in front of the blurred glass and watch for another turn.

Lillian didn’t worry so much at first, but as it started to approach 9:00 pm she found herself a little worried and a little scared. The storm had been rattling around the old cabin like a spirit set free for a spell, trying to get in. One window, then another, then another would rattle as if different parts of the old cabin were trying to get her a message.

As she waited her mind wondered off to the Sundays when they would attend the United Methodist Church near the town of Denver. She often saw the other families and how there seemed to be so much tension, strife and fighting between the members of the family. her father always said, “Lillian Grace, respect and love go a mighty long way to solve problems. Sometimes you just have to wrap your enemy up in a big ole bear hug and remember what is really important.” Oh, her and her father had many a disagreement, but he was always the first one to put his arms around her when she was angry and isolated. He sure lived out what he felt and thought, which brought her right back to why she was sitting here all alone.

The cabin was getting cold and everything in her was speaking in a voice that chilled her deeper than the cold, telling her something was wrong.

There was nothing helpful she could ‘do’, so she decided it was time to start praying again, because sitting around worry wasn’t doing anyone any good. She also knew that even though her father was a friend to the Cherokee, not all were friendly and the lands he was traversing weren’t Cherokee lands. Her father always said that, “White man, yellow man, black man, red man, makes no difference. They all bleed, they all die, they all love and they all hate.”

“Dear Lord, my father is in your hands, please bring him home safe.” Lillian got up, stoked the fire again, checked the pocket watch, and wrapped back up again for another 15 minutes. Her mind was no longer there in the cabin, but wandering through the years she had with him, thinking of how he had changed her life, how he had taught her so much with his gentle but strong way. Folks knew not to cross him, yet they also knew that he cared. She always found that hard to accept at times… the hardness, but gentleness of his nature.

Lillian kept up the routine till 11:00 pm when she heard a noise outside. It sounded like the clashing of a steam engine, but it was her father’s horse near the front of the cabin. The storm was still beating against the windows but she ran to the door, flung it open to receive a flash of lightning, a crashing wave of rain, and her father’s riderless horse trying to find comfort from the storm near the porch.

“Pa!” she screamed through the rain and lightening, but of course she could hear nothing over the onslaught of the storm. “Where is my father she thought?” Cautiously she went out to the porch and put the rails between herself and the spooked animal. She tried to comfort him while inspecting him. He was scratched and cut in a few small places. The saddle was hanging sideways and the leather straps appeared to be torn. Clearly Cletus, the horse, had been running the way only a panicked horse can.

She also knew, something must have really spooked Cletus for him to leave her father. She could still see his hoof prints during the lightning strike. There was no option no matter what her father’s voice in her head was saying… she had to try and find him.

She quickly packed, threw a poncho over herself, grabbed water, her father’s extra medical bag, bits of carrots for Cletus and went back out. She led him over to the barn carefully, trying to calm him down. Once inside, she pulled off the broken saddle, and put on her good one, fed him some carrots, and mounted him in the barn. Clearly he was still spooked, but she had a calming affect on him. They exited the barn as if sucked into the black void of the night, and entered the engulfing rain. She was going to have to rely on Cletus and the lightning to track back the way the poor animal had travelled.

Slowly they made their way back down the path toward the main road. Cletus was having a hard time with crashing thunder and lighting, the thrashing trees and limbs acted as if they were trying to grabbed them both. Each time one reached out, it caused them both to  jump. The path was strewn with branches and leaves, and more than once Lillian had to go around or over a fallen tree. She lost track of time, something her father always warned her about. She ‘knew’ where she was, but the path, though traveled many times, was becoming more and more unfamiliar. Her surroundings, which used to be marked by solitude and ‘knowing’, were quickly becoming a fear filled place, threatening to swallow her up.

Traveling with Pa always felt like he was preparing her for school, but what Lillian was soon to learn was, he had been preparing her for this moment, and the rest of the moments of her life.

Her mind was racing with what to do, how far to go, where to look, and the ‘what if I miss him in this storm, what if he isn’t here and what will I do then!’ She prayed for guidance, she prayed for help, she prayed for her father.

He always used to say, “For every complex problem in life there is always a simple solution. Take relationships… they can get very complicated, but in the end, offering forgiveness and apologies resets the moment and starts the relationship clock over again.”

The lightning and thunder crashed. Cletus stopped in his tracks. In the flash she tried her best to see where she was. Her father had taught her to always be aware of her surroundings and look for things to be ‘markers’. They had walked and trotted this path many times over the years.

She was near the creek bed, two miles from the house. She closed her eyes against the deluge trying to find her home, her father, her rock…

——————-

The eyelids, puffy with age, slowly opened. The wrinkles lining her face were heavy with laughter, sorrow, and years, as if pitted from the sands of time.  Lillian Grace told this story, from 50 years ago anytime someone asked about her father and life out in the wilderness. Everyone always locked into her spirit as she told the tale of how her father lived and died… a real man, a man that made a difference, a man that convinced her that anyone can be anything they wanted to be. Her father was more than a man, he was a gift… a gift that lived in her. She had determined that night, 50 years ago, when her father didn’t come back home, that she would give everyday, what he had given. Love, life and lessons to anyone who would listen…

Life goes on. For any of us left behind in ‘this’ world, we know the pain of someone, old or young, being taken. Sometimes it feels like a searing tear or rip that is raw and unexpected. Other times it’s like a gentle lifting of a veil, or the passing of a mantle. For those moments, when it is prepared for, the grief might be just as clear and sharp, but it is wrapped in a bow and teed up for the next life to take over… it’s a gift.

Safe Journey’s this week.