"Greeting cards have all been sent . . . "
I know that a lot of us remember that line from a song that the Carpenters sang called "Merry Christmas, Darling". Since so many of my Musings are created from memories and reminiscences, I thought I'd add one more:
Its the early 70's and my sister, Susan, is engaged to be married to a man who decided to see if he liked the idea of being a missionary so he went to Bangladesh the year before their wedding. Actually, they became engaged moments before he left so we always teased her that he just didn't want her meeting anyone else while he was gone; she laughed but, you could tell by the look in her eye that the engagement ring didn't make a difference. She was a "Goner"!In all of the years that have passed, I don't believe that there has ever been a Christmas when that memory hasn't slipped past my 'playback' button. I don't know if Sue remembers it or not . . . I'm going to send this page to her daughter (as well as to Sue) so that Natali can pass it on to her brothers. They already know the strength of the love of their parents after all of these years but it might be nice to know a story from the time of their courtship that they may not have heard.On Christmas morning that year, Sue and I were in the kitchen doing something to clean vegetables or peel potatoes, getting ready for the holiday meal that my mother was preparing. The radio was on and the melodic strains of Karen Carpenter's voice was singing, "Greeting cards have all been sent . . . ". Since I was still allowed to be somewhat insensitive because I was so young, I started ripping into the song in my best Karen Carpenter impersonation only to hear Susan sniffling.
I looked over at her and saw tears streaming down her face! I was so surprised-- what could be making my sweet sister, Sue, the one who always seemed so happy, so complete, to me, cry? I went and put my arm around her and, looked at her eyes-- It was then I remembered: Oh, yeah, she's a "Goner"!!
My sister, Sue and, that missionary man, Bill have been married for a LONG time-- I'm not good enough with math to tell you how many years its been but, I know its been a long, long time. They've spent the majority of their marriage and raising their three beautiful kids in Brazil moving from Manaus to Sao Paulo. All three of their kids are now either in college or having graduated college and, next Christmas (2000), Sue and Bill will be returning to Brazil to continue their work. They'll be in a much smaller and more civilized town, Bauru. And, at Christmas 2000, as with all of the other years that have passed since their engagement, I'll remember Sue, standing in Mom's kitchen, sniffling with tears running down her face, as Karen Carpenter sings . . . "Greating cards have all been sent . . . "
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