This is my last card in my 50-week long personal challenge. Each week this year, I've read a chapter in the book "50 Truths Worth Knowing" and used it as inspiration for a card. This is Chapter 50. I'm kind of sad to see this challenge end, but I do have a different 50-week challenge planned for 2018.
In Chapter 50, Christine recalled that one Christmas her family just wasn't in the Christmas mood. In fact, Christmas seemed stale, boring, lifeless. There was no festive feeling in her family's home just north of Boston.
They unwrapped presents and then "escaped" to their separate rooms. Dad when to his basement computer, her sister went to her bedroom to watch TV, her older brother went to a friend's house and she went to the kitchen. It was from her spot in the kitchen that she overheard her younger brother and mom talking somewhat awkwardly in the living room.
"Mom, you're going to be a grandmother."
"Oh, no."
Tom was a 22-year-old college student with two more years until graduation. His girlfriend was 3 months along in the pregnancy and his plan was to quit college, find a job (any job), marry, and raise his child.
Their mom wanted to be happy for Tom, but she wasn't.
Christine moved to the doorway of the living room and soon other family members gathered as well - her dad, her sister. Dad reminded Tom of his aspirations (to be an engineer, something he had a talent for) and their sister cried (she never cries).
Advice was given. More tears were shed. Dreams were both squashed and born. The day changed everything.
The following summer Zack was born - all 8 pounds 7 ounces of him. He was no longer just a worry for this family, he was a real part of it. And that Christmas (with 4-month-old Zack) no one went to their own rooms after the presents were opened. Instead they gathered around to watch Zack smile and gurgle. He drew them together, not just that Christmas, but through the years. His dimples, his brown eyes, and his joyful enthusiasm for life brought out the best in the family.
As a four-year-old, he loved every gift he received - he'd laugh and applaud... every pair of socks, every shirt, every gift. It was as if that was the most beloved gift in the entire world. "Isn't this great?" he'd exclaim. And because of him, it was.
Christine summed it up this way: "After all these years, it's easy to forget that Zack was once the boy whom none of us wanted. The boy who had worried our family - and who, in so doing, made us realize we still were one."
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