I put down the book I was reading. My husband, Arnie, fresh from having taken a shower, stretched out next to me on our bed. We talked about our day and who we had seen and talked to. I told him what our children, Niki and Tammie and I had done that evening. Then, yawning, Arnie turned to his side. He said, “I’m tired.” Then he fell instantly asleep.
Placing a bookmark in my book, I set it on the bedside table. The lamp’s light made our pale peach bedroom walls glow a warm, happy color. I glanced over at my sleeping husband and experienced a moment of total appreciation for the love we shared. In that blessed moment of realization, I leaned against my husband’s warm body and breathed in the scent of his freshly showered skin. I very clearly remember thinking, “Remember this! I may not always have this for as long as I’d like.”
After my husband died in 2007, I remembered that moment with especial tenderness and recognized it as a moment of grace. Memories like that one gave me comfort amid the loss.
A moment of grace is a time where a person is totally aware of the preciousness of what is possessed. Sometimes it is a moment of respite between the troubles of the past and whatever future troubles that we might have come. My husband and I had weathered the loss of an infant and had raised another one with a handicap, but that was all behind us. We anticipated growing old together. I had no idea that soon a radical change would take place in my life. I never dreamed that Arnie would die at such a young age as 56.
Now, looking back, I recognize that I have experienced these special moments of grace on several occasions through the years. One of these moments happened when I packed and moved out of my childhood home. I stopped at the door of my bedroom to look back and remembered my growing up years. I was happy to be a young adult, but the future felt both exciting and scary. Another moment of grace in my life happened the moment my first baby was placed in my arms. I looked at her and understood, “This baby needs more care than the average baby, and I’ve never been a mother before!” Sadly, Christy only lived two months.