THINGS SAID AND LEFT UNSAID
A Widow Bit – Nov. 30, 2008
By Mary Koch

            Thanksgiving was especially bountiful, not in terms of food – though there was plenty. I enjoyed a bounty of connections.

            We’d planned a quiet day, my mother and I, staying at her assisted living apartment instead of joining the large family gathering, a couple hours’ drive to the north. Still, just as nature abhors a vacuum, my nature seems to abhor an empty day.

            We started off at the church where my greatly talented sister is organist and choir director. Afterward, we shared brunch at Denny’s.

            Denny’s! I can just hear my husband chortling. I think it was only the third time I’ve eaten at a Denny’s, and Thanksgiving to boot. OK, so I’m a food snob. And if John was laughing, I did too (silently) as I dug into a plate of sizzling fat and high cholesterol. When in Rome …

            The day included phone calls from family from around the country – long-distance connections like the threads of love that bind us. My nephew and his girlfriend visited, bringing a bouquet of hydrangeas, cut from their yard for Grandma.

            Later in the afternoon, my 92-year-old mother and I visited my childhood friend who lives nearby. She was spending the same kind of quiet Thanksgiving with her 90-year-old father. This friendship dates back to our eighth grade English class, when we and a third student teamed up to write a play. The play, thank God, has been lost to the ages, but the friendship endures.

            This friend, less than a month older than I, has tended to move through life’s passages well ahead of me. Her husband died suddenly a few years ago, just as the two of them were entering those fabled, golden years of retirement. She kept going with the quiet courage and firm set of chin that have made me cherish her all these years.

            We shared Thanksgiving memories as we sat with our respective parents in her quiet living room, warmed by the gas fire as darkness blanketed the misty afternoon. We laughed when we remembered how I would forego the pumpkin and mincemeat pies served in my home. Neither held much appeal. As soon as dishes were done, I’d race the two blocks to her house, where her mother – now gone – would save me a piece of dessert. It was something we never had at my house – plum pudding with hard sauce. (I told you I was a food snob.)

            We spoke of many things, but we did not mention the chemotherapy that my friend will begin on Wednesday. She joins a cadre of friends who have not only survived but triumphed over breast cancer. I’m praying for her, but I’m not worried about her. She has been a friend to many, and she will receive much support throughout this time of healing.

            And once again, as she has for more than 50 years, she’ll remind me how it’s done – for times when I need a dose of quiet courage and firm set of chin.