The Ornament

Like many high school relationships, I thought it was forever, that is until I matured a little at twenty.  He and I were not a good match and I had grown up enough to figure that out.  Still, it was painful because I loved his family and would miss them very much.  It was September and I broke up with my boyfriend of three years just before I went back to college.  It was not easy.  At the end of that semester, while home on break, his mother called me just before Christmas to say that her son was not at home and would I please come see her for a little while.  I was happy to go and we hugged and cried.  She said that the last time she saw me walk out their front door, she knew it was over.  It was written across my face, she said.  She had a gift for me, a heartfelt, I will miss you, I loved you as a daughter gift.  Inside a red velvet box was the most beautiful Christmas ornament I had ever seen.  It was a Celtic infinity knot which represents no beginning and no end.  The love she felt for me would always be, she said.  I had been worried that she would be angry that I had hurt her son but she wasn’t and understood that I had to move on.  She said that in time I would think of her less as my life changed, but hoped that with an ornament I would remember each year at Christmastime that she had loved me.  It’s been a long, long time and I smile every year as I reach for the red velvet box with the beautiful ornament and remember the love and kindness that was given to me.-Rachel (OH)