Gratitude is the memory of
the heart
Cari Stein was 26 at the
time and had just moved to Baltimore to take on a new challenge.
She had been hired for her dream job--as a producer for a network
television station. Life was good.
"I remember the day, shortly
after I started the job," Cari recalls. "I felt sick to my stomach.
I had to go lie down in the green room and rest after the script
was ready and we were about to go on air."
She ignored the symptoms
because she couldn't afford to take time off work. And, she says,
"I was really enjoying myself. But it got so bad I finally went to
a doctor and found out I had a serious infection and needed to be
hospitalised." Being new in town and alone, Cari decided to return
home to a hospital in Brooklyn, New York.
"I spent the following week
in a hospital, with my mother and father by my side," Cari
remembers. "We played board games, cards, and talked about life.
Afterward, during my recuperation, we shopped, relaxed at the local
pool, and enjoyed each other's company. And once I was comfortable
eating again, my father brought delicious corned beef sandwiches
from my family's delicatessen. It turned out to be a special time
in my life."
But what made it even more
significant and poignant than she ever could have imagined is that
a few months later her mother died of a heart attack. Had Cari not
been ill, she would have missed out on all those special moments
she shared with her parents. She understood that she had been given
the gift of time with her mom, her best friend. What had appeared
to be adversity became a blessing.
As it happened, Cari was not
in Brooklyn the night her mother died; she had returned to
Baltimore to go back to work. At 2:00
A.M.she received a call from her sister-in-law. Her mother, only 54
at the time, had died as she was getting ready for bed.
"It was a crushing blow and
probably the most defining moment of my life." Cari
says.
Today, 25 years later,
thinking about that night still brings tears to her eyes. "But
thinking about those weeks the summer before my mother died makes
me smiles," she says. "It turns out that my infection was no
accident or coincidence, it was a gift--a chance to spend
uninterrupted time with my mother, to enjoy ourselves and bask in
our love for each other. For that I will be forever
grateful."
