Dear Mom --
HOW DO I EXPLAIN WHAT HAPPENED THIS MORNING? DO I CALL THESE MIRACLES?
COVID has closed everything down, including of course Hevreh of Southern Berkshire, our wonderful synagogue in Great Barrington, MA.
It being Saturday morning, I wanted to connect to a Shabbat service. A friend encouraged me to ZOOM into her temple's service. I was excited. I even donned my
To say the service was chaotic does not begin to describe what was happening on the Zoom screen this morning. Having dozens of people trying to sing prayers together at the same moment wasn't working at all!
I was more than a little bored, so I began scrolling through some old word files and suddenly I came upon a word file called
‘OH SPRING1”
which originally contained a poem I wrote for a magazine called EDIBLE BERKSHIRES.
BUT SOMEHOW THE POEM HAD DISAPPEARED.
INSTEAD THE FILE CONTAINED QUITE AMAZINGLY A BIRTHDAY GREETING THAT I WROTE TO YOU, MOM, ON March 30, 2013!!!
YOU BEING DENA CLEMINTINA RICCI, AND IT BEING
YOUR 87TH BIRTHDAY.
How can this possibly be, I asked myself. How can a letter I wrote in March of 1987 suddenly appear in March of 2020 under a different file name? But really, I shouldn't be altogether surprised.
STRANGE THINGS LIKE THIS KEEP HAPPENING. Ever since I started writing this book about my ancestors, time keeps collapsing! It's today and then it's yesterday and then it's tomorrow!!
But Mom, help me! Should I call these events COINCIDENCES? MIRACLES? SYNCHRONICITIES?
They are all certainly very weird things that I cannot explain. MY SPIRITUAL TEACHER MARY M SAYS IT’S TIME I’M WILLING TO ACCEPT THE FACT THAT THESE MIRACLES KEEP OCCURRING. It's time I start keeping track of them.
And as Peg, my forever writing buddy says, maybe I could make sense of all this by writing letters!
Okay, back to Saturday.
As I was sitting there puzzling over the disappearance of my poem, my husband walked into my study.
"Going to the grocery store so wish me luck," he said. This was his first visit to the grocery story since Covid crashlanded.
I turned to him. "Hey honey, would you buy me a small purple orchid," I begged. Not that I need another orchid. My kitchen counter has seven already.
He chuckled. "Honey, I have all I can do to buy food in these COVID times. You can do without another orchid."
He left and then I turned back to the birthday greeting that I had written mom back in 2013.
Imagine my shock when I read this:
"Dear Mom,
Today is your 87th birthday.
When you turn 87, there aren't a whole lot of birthday presents one can buy.
You want health and happiness for
Yourself and all of those
You love
The one I bought you a year
A few months ago
all the blossoms
had disappeared
and Dad said, let's
get rid of
that plant it's just three bare sticks.
But no, Mom,
despite your vision issues,
you saw something
tiny and green budding there
on one of those bare branches
something wonderful
four or five new pink blossoms appeared!
So eager you were to visit
the sun room
each morning
each week, on Tuesday,
you put two ice cubes in the pot
not a drop more water.
You were just adorable
caring for your orchid.
So today, your day, it
wasn't difficult to know
what to buy you
I ought to get my mother
another orchid I said
so
I did.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY MOM!
We Love You So Much,
Claud ***** I ASKED RICH FOR ORCHIDS AND HE DIDN'T WANT TO BUY ONE BUT MOM BROUGHT THEM TO ME INSTEAD. SO OKAY MOM YOU ARE SENDING ME SIGNS AND I HAVE FINALLY STOPPED DOUBTING IT. I'm going to do what Mary says: record all the miracles that are happening to me all the time!
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