Miracle Flower

This is the story of the Miracle Flower, as told by my sister. Our dad died in 1992.

I spent all the afternoon of Wednesday, December 20 2006, cooking two lasagnas that would be the main dishes for our Christmas dinner at my Aunt Virginia's house.

At some point my mom, who was napping, came downstairs; we talked a little about how to cook the lasagnas, you know, nothing special. My daughters were not at home, only my mother and I were there.

Minutes later, I went out to the backyard into the big dog fence trying to find some basil for the sauce but I couldn’t find any. So I went back into the house, empty-handed, and continued chopping stuff.

Suddenly, I turned back and looked towards the microwave oven, around which were my chopped onions, and then I saw a hibiscus bud. You know, a little hibiscus bud, closed, just laying there. I got scared and surprised. I didn't bring anything back from the backyard. Immediately I thought of my dad... but no, how could that be...Well, my mom was around there but, why would she cut a hibiscus bud to put it next to chopped onions and garlic?

I didn't touch the bud. Every so often I looked over the bud to make sure it was still there... and there it was. I thought of my dad many times, but that was it. Maybe it was my mom who for an unknown reason went out to the garden and picked up the bud.

The next morning I went downstairs to the kitchen and, oh surprise! The little hibiscus bud had turned into a gorgeous fully open flower! You know that hibiscus flowers don't last long after being cut. The buds die without blooming, and the flowers start to die really soon after being cut. But my flower was beautiful. I started to cry.

My mom told me that she, too, had seen the bud the day before and thought that I had brought it; when I told her it wasn't me either - knowing that there was no one else at home - she confirmed that it was my dad. I couldn’t stop crying.

The message that I get from this is that, of course, my dad loves me and he wanted to spoil me a little while I was cooking alone; he wanted to tell me that I wasn’t alone in our house because he's always there with me, and that, above all, he's ok in heaven.

Well, my dad gave me a token of his love in a moment when I feel particularly sad and hopeless, and I believe that he tried to tell me to have faith because everything will be ok.

My mom told me that my dad was happy because I was cooking J.

The thing is that the flower stayed fresh - without water - until approximately 7:30 p.m. Simply splendid. Mele asked me to take a picture of it around 1:00 p.m.

My dad gave me a flower for this Christmas. 

What do you think?