Special thanks going out for a special birthday card

Someone knew that it was my birthday last Sunday, and they decided to do something special for me and my family.

Birthday Card made with Iris Folding (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

A special birthday card arrived in the mail Wednesday.  It appears to be homemade, made out of construction paper with stickers decorating it inside and out.  It’s a nice card, something that took a bit of time to create.

What makes it even nicer was what was inside the card.  It contained three separate gift cards — one to help pay for bills, food, living expenses, whatever is needed; one from a well-known Italian restaurant to go toward a meal for my lovely wife and me; and one to a favorite ice cream shop of ours, for dessert.

What makes it even more touching were the words written inside the card, plus the fact that I have no idea who sent such a fabulous card and gift to us.  It was sent anonymously, from an address in Salt Lake City.  Maybe it’s someone in our church (we’ve had friends from our church do things like this before), maybe it’s a Facebook friend, maybe it’s an old friend from as far back as high school days who lives in the area — a popular local writer in her own right who’s offered help to us before, maybe it’s a relative stranger, I honestly don’t know.

To whomever it was that sent the card and the wonderful gifts … we thank you, it was a totally complete and pleasant surprise, a terrific pick-me-up at a time we could really use it.

The card reads as follows:

John,

I follow your blog often, and your Valentine’s Day post really touched me.  You are right — we don’t need to show our love to each other in “stuff,” but in kindness and actions and words.

I pray for a great job for you each week.  In the meantime, please use these gifts to pay any bills/purchase groceries, and the rest to take Amy out for a lovely Valentine’s Day dinner (complete with dessert, of course!).  It is so encouraging to me to see your love for your wife, and her support & encouragement to you.

Keep blogging, keep fighting, keep looking up.

Happy belated birthday — and may this year bring you all the blessings you and your family deserve.

Your friend

This was a gesture with sentiments that brought tears to my eyes.  Gestures like these are always greatly appreciated by us.  We only wish that we weren’t in a position where gestures like these were needed, and it makes us that much more determined to work toward making things better for ourselves, praying harder for things to improve in our lives to where we can provide for ourselves more and “pay it forward.”  It’s gestures like these from this anonymous friend that keep hope alive for us.

It brings to mind a blog article that I meant to write last weekend and never got around to actually writing.  It was my birthday last Sunday, but it was also Amy’s birthday two days before that, the day after Valentine’s Day.

We have dreams.  I have dreams of the kinds of things I’d like to provide for Amy, as a “gift” for the both of us.  I dream of giving her that horse property that she’s always wanted, ever since the earliest days of our marriage.  I dream of tooling around on that horse property myself, on a horse or an ATV, checking fences and irrigation ditches, or just sitting propped up next to a fence post and watching the horses graze or run around.  I dream of sharing times on that ranch with my lovely wife.

We dream of living comfortably enough — not richly, mind you — to where we can give to those in need more than we’re already doing now.  We dream of going on mission trips together, to Haiti or Africa or South America or wherever it’s needed, not to mention our own little corner of the world.

We know what it’s like to be in need, and we want to help in the worst way.  Our dreams aren’t the selfish kind.

These are the kinds of gifts I dream about when I think about what I’d like to give my lovely wife.  They’re dreams we can enjoy together, dreams we can be rewarded by together.  They’re dreams I’d love to give her, dreams I’d love to see come true.

It’s gifts like the one we received on Wednesday from the anonymous friend that keep us pushing forward, even when it seems like the odds are against us.

It’s gifts like the one we received on Wednesday from the anonymous friend that keep me saying a particular prayer, over and over, whenever I begin to feel even a twinge of doubt or fear.

“Lord, carry me.”

Thank you, my friend.

About these ads