After my wife died, holidays went quiet. This year, my family promised they’d all come back for dinner. I cooked all day, called everyone like my wife used to, and waited.
By nightfall, no one came — except a police officer who wanted to arrest me! At 78 years old, I’ve been counting down the days to this holiday dinner like a kid waiting for Christmas. See, I had a plan to get my whole family together for the first time since my wife, Margaret, passed two years ago.
I gently pressed my fingertips against the framed photo of my wife on my bedside table. I woke early that morning. I sat on the edge of the bed, feet on the cold floor, and said it out loud to nobody.
In the kitchen, I opened Margaret’s recipe book. Years ago, she’d taped a list of holiday meals to the front cover, alongside the page numbers for the recipes to make them. I set the potatoes to boil, but there was something else I needed to do before I focused on cooking.
I picked up the phone and sat at the kitchen table, just like Margaret used to. I dialed Sarah first. My daughter.
She laughed. That was good. That was what I needed.
“You sound like Mom,” she said. Oh, that hit hard… I hadn’t expected that. “That’s because she trained me.”
For just a second, I saw her.
Not Sarah, the 45-year-old lawyer with the downtown office, but the gap-toothed kid with the ponytail and the backpack too big for her little shoulders. Then I called Michael, my eldest. “Family dinner today!
I made your favorite potatoes, the ones you and your sister used to fight over.”
“You always took her side,” he said. But he was smiling. I could hear it.
He chuckled. “We’ll try, Dad.”
The grandkids were last — Michael’s eldest kids, Emma and Jake. They were just getting started in life, and too busy for old people, usually.
I put them on speakerphone and heard chaos in the background. Music. Voices.
I put on my funny grandpa voice. “Is your old man still cool enough for your schedule? I’m hosting a family dinner today, and I’ve got real dessert.”
That got their attention.
“Okay, okay. Maybe,” Emma said. Maybe. I hung up smiling anyway.
I put the radio on while I cooked. Margaret always used to hum Bing Crosby, and it felt like I was bringing her closer to me by repeating her old habits. I still missed her so much… but that was precisely why it was important to get the whole family together again.
The story doesn’t end here –
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