Sunday, April 8, 2018

The gift

I can’t stop thinking about this.  Since it happened today, it’s been on my mind.  
This afternoon, my cousins Emily and Lindsey threw a beautiful bridal shower for Shannon.  Emily is Aunt Linda’s daughter in-law and her husband, my cousin Kevin, has always been incredibly close to Sha.  Aunt Linda is also Shannon’s godmother.  The shower was lovely - delicious food, beautiful decor and wonderful company!  We all had fun celebrating Shannon’s upcoming marriage.  
Shannon started opening gifts.... there were a lot!  I noticed a particular gift right away as it wasn’t wrapped.  It was a beverage tub with an insulating cover monogrammed with ‘The Reynolds” and filled with towels.  I even took a picture of it.  Shannon opened her gifts, and then came to the tub.  As she picked it up, Emily’s voice rang out over the commotion.  She told Shannon that gift was from Aunt Linda.  Shannon paused and looked up.  We were all confused. Emily explained that a few years ago, she was shopping with Aunt Linda.  I don’t remember all the specifics, but Aunt Linda saw the tub and decided to get one for for Shannon as a gift when she got married.  A year and a half after she died, Shannon received this gift.  The Klare’s remembered it, had it monogrammed and Uncle Jerry filled it with towels from Shannon’s registry.  Tears started flowing.  And then... a song started to play.  Music had been playing the entire shower in the background, basically unnoticed.  But as Shannon was opening the gift from Aunt Linda, a special song that means so much to our family started to play.  “What a Wonderful World”.  No one put the song on.  It just started to randomly play.  But it wasn’t random.  It was Aunt Linda, letting us know that she was with us.  I truly believe that.  




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