The ping on my phone indicated an incoming email. That's not usually a momentous occasion, and it was in the inbox a bit before it was opened. If I had known the sweet surprise that ping was announcing, I'd have opened my inbox the minute it sounded! The subject read, "is this". Is this what? There was no attachment. The text said, "Is this you, your mama, and Cookie?" My cousin, Terry Lee, was trying to identify the people in an old family video.
As the attachment finally opened, there was a picture of a little family from fifty years ago.
This single still frame from an old home movie captured the only picture I have ever seen of my family together. The one and only picture with my daddy. As the photo was loading, I realized all four of us were in the picture and I cried out loud, "It's my daddy!" I was thrilled. I am thrilled.
Just a few short years after the video was made, my parents divorced, and I rarely ever saw him again, but I loved him, and I was his "Princess". I realize that the photo speaks volumes about the dynamics of my family, but those issues healed long ago.
Somehow, that blue sky and those clouds and my daddy all dressed up for church was a reminder that gone does not mean forgotten, and deceased does not mean disposed. One day, I will see him again, and it will be a little like going to church together again, only much, much better.
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