Saturday, November 21, 2009

This thing called love

There was a man of great wealth and means. Though surrounded by people he loved and who loved him in return, his life was not complete. Nothing and no one could satisfy the desire of his heart: to be reconnected with his daughter.

Separated since her birth, he’d learned of her likes and dislikes from a distance. Now she was at an age to choose and he had a great idea. Known for being a master at arranging details and using circumstances to accomplish his goals, he was prepared to do whatever it took to win her love and affection. Nothing would stop him.

He planted her favorite flowers on the path she walked each evening and along the route she took to get to work each day. He negotiated with local radio personnel to play songs about love, especially between fathers and daughters. With the cooperation of others, those his daughter knew and those she didn’t, he personalized his message of love - a loyal friend with an embracing arm, her elderly neighbor with a gentle touch, a co-worker with compassionate eyes, the smile of a stranger conveying value and respect.

The father wrote of his love, binding it in a book, and arranged for copies to be set down where she might reach for them: The waiting room of the medical clinic, the spa where she went for regular pedicures, the hotel-room bedside table where she stayed on monthly business trips and even up in her dusty attic where she might find it amongst the last of her mother’s belongings, packed in a few boxes.

It took some time but his daughter started responding.

Like waking from a deep sleep, the world around her seemed fresh, new, and vibrant with life.

Everywhere she looked she saw her favorite blue Forget-Me-Knots, as if the seeds had been carried by the wind, sprouting and growing where they settled. Even the touch of the sun on her skin spoke love to her heart; the gentle, spring breeze whispered her name.

She noticed one day that every song she heard seemed to focus on Love and with that awareness, emotions, long buried, began to stir and revive.

Quite by accident, she stumbled upon a strange book and began finding copies of it in the oddest of places. A wisp of a memory sent her on a search through her attic where, surprisingly, she found a dusty copy of her own. Curiosity kept her mesmerized, and as she read, she discovered startling similarities between the story and her own life. Before she knew it, she was consumed by a need to know the details of her life; the need to find her father.

The man’s heart was full; his daughter was finally ready to meet him. Having tenderly prepared even this moment he made a dramatic, eye-opening entrance and introduced himself as her father.

Just as he’d hoped and better than her wildest dreams, she opened her arms and welcomed him in.

1 comment:

  1. Bonnie did you write this? Outstanding I love the poetic prose

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