Two Boxes

Sweetheart, your mom sent me two packages today, just before Christmas, just before I’m headed out there. And everything inside and about them is all, all, all just wonderful and amazing and so very thoughtful. The boxes were numbered one and two and I was instructed to open number one first because inside was a card and note explaining things. On the front of the card is a beautiful angel, just like you. The note tells me about care of the item within the box – your pretty black sunhat. Your mom has attached a lovely gold seahorse pin to it. Saying that she thinks it is something you might do yourself, one of your “tricks” as you might say. I find myself gasping and weeping at the sight of it. She’s tucked a bit of wrapping paper into the crown so that it stays upright and full and the instructions are about how I should keep that inside the hat should I decide to hang it (she’s also included a lovely wall hook for just that purpose. I stand in the kitchen with your beautiful hat in my arms looking around a bit lost, not knowing where might be a good home for it. Finally, still sobbing, I settle on placing it quietly for now on the bed next to your place that I never turn down, next to and then, thinking, atop the pillow where your famous purple shirt lay as well, before coming back into the kitchen where the boxes sit on the floor. I keep unpacking the first one, finding the hook the note mentioned, thinking I probably won't hang the hat because I may not have the proper tools, only to find the next thing thoughtfully included in the box are the proper tools – a multiple bit screwdriver - also carefully, thoughtfully gift wrapped. I set them aside together and open box two. Your mom has included swiffers on top (Needed! This place is awash in dust, brick dust, plaster dust, every kind of dust from 10 months of destruction/construction in the "posh" new parts of the building). Next, the wonderful owl sachets. Everything in this box that I touch smells lovely. An infusion of the most intoxicatingly beautiful aromas float into the air – your kind of cotton candy scent. You are everywhere, my sweetheart. Next, I spot what seems by its shape to be a glasses case. I wonder if it's the second pair of Ray Bans I'd sent your Dad (he thought he lost the first pair I got him for Father’s Day so I replaced them but a few weeks later the first pair turned up…) rendered redundant. I open it and am in tears again – they’re the sunglasses with hearts all over the frames that I bought you on Valentines on our trip up to Lake Tahoe, the weekend “We Went to the Snow”. Oh, my sweetheart. Oh, my love! The rest of the box is filled with four lush, lovely folded bath towels with the “S” Serafin monogram from the house in Davis, smelling wonderful and fresh. They come in handy immediately still awash in tears for you. It's all all all so indescribably lovely and thoughtful. I immediately call your mom to thank her so very much. And I know you’re with me, holding my hand, stroking my chest and telling me that I am your treasure. And I know I need never ashamed to cry for you. Knowing, my love, that you are even nearer by than I can readily imagine. Until that day. Until that day...xxxxoooo