The Card

My grandmother died when I was nine. She lived her last few years with us when she was bedridden and my mother provided round-the-clock nursing care for her. Not an easy job with four young children and a husband working a lot of overtime.

We, kids, all had jobs to help with my grandmother. My older sisters had much more responsibility than I did and helped with some of the nursing care.  Since I was younger, I got more of the comfort care jobs. I would brush my grandmother's hair or crawl in bed with her and rub her back. She said I was better medicine for her than anything the doctors could come up with. I was proud of that and enjoyed spending this close time with her.

Then one day in third grade I came home with a headache and a fever. Soon there were spots all over me. I had the measles. The big measles we called them because they lasted two weeks sometimes, and mine did. During this time, I had to stay upstairs away from my grandmother's room downstairs. She was much too weak to handle something like getting the measles. While I was sick, my mother would deliver messages to me from my grandmother and I would send messages back. One day, my mother brought a card to me from my grandmother. It was a get well card with a rabbit on the front against a blue background. She wrote me a letter inside and told me how much she missed me. I loved getting the card and have treasured it ever since.

However, somewhere along the way, it got lost. I've always been a bit sad about that although I told myself that the memory of it was what was really important. Then a few days ago while going through papers to pack, I found it! I was elated. It was stuck between some other papers in box of mementos from my high school days.

You know, they say that when you move, you will for sure lose something. Well, this time I found something. Something very important to me. And I am very happy about that.

(Unfortunately, I packed the card away before I could take a picture of it.)