A Gift of Time

The Boston Herald

"Give Time," the letter suggested. "Time is the ideal gift.”

Would that we could give time, not the magazine, but the real thing, all wrapped up and held together by a shiny red bow. Happy birthday, Dad. These  are the days of your life. Open the package and you're young again, kissing your mother good-bye, hurrying out the door, rushing to school, eager for life.

Fantasy. Pure conjecture, this giving time, yet wonderful to consider.

If I could, I would collect time, pack years in a box for a daughter whose adolescence weighs upon her, who looks in a mirror aching to see Christie Brinkley and sees just herself, too plain, too big, too everything. She would remove the cover from her gift, peek inside and discover the woman she will be, the beauty I already see - bright, witty, delightful. A girl to be proud of.  And she would smile, adolescence by-passed. And be content with who she is.

If I could, I would save time for my son, gather yesterday and today and pack them away tenderly so that years from now, when he is a man and encumbered by a man's responsibilities, he would be able to live again two days when life's biggest problem was where to play baseball.

I would freeze time for my youngest daughter, stop the days from marching past, not for her sake - she's eager to grow - but for mine. I don't want her to be too big for my lap. I don't want her to realize I'm not perfect.  I don't want her telling me she's old enough to wait alone for the bus and to please not embarrass her in front of her friends. I want her to like being with me forever. As she does now.

Time. I'd give a huge package full of healthy weeks and happy days to my mother-in-law, 74 on the outside, 37 inside, my friend, my confidant. Thousands of days. That she may live forever. That we may grow old together.

I'd give back years to my mother. Months spent unconscious, seasons when she was unaware of changes around her. A dozen lost Christmases and birthdays and family celebrations. I would watch as she opened the package with fingers that are twisted and stiff, tiring from the effort. The box would open and a light, like vapor, would escape and magically she would change, her fingers growing strong and straight, her legs limber, the wheelchair gone. The clock would be ticking and she would see her grandchildren growing younger. She would be back in her old house, in the old neighborhood, and the hi-fi would be on and she would be singing with Mary Martin, and there would be no more hospitals and doctors and nurses.

Then it would be my father's tum and he would open his gift and inside would be a spring night, rich with the smell of new life. And he would recognize the night and hurry to his mother's house and warn her, "Don't smoke when you're tired, Ma, and never when you're in bed." And she would see the concern in his eyes and put out the cigarette and be alive in the morning.

All the limitless possibilities. A gift of time could erase all the errors, undo all the mistakes. And we'd have the privilege of playing again and again, like a favorite record, all the good times. Our first movie, our first kiss, our first dance.

And the dance could go on forever.