[Critique Group 1] Sally's July submission

[Sally Rosenthal]

The Gift

by Sally Rosenthal

 

Wh

en my paratrooper father jumped out of an airplane sixty-nine years ago and
landed on the  Normandy beach during the D-Day invasion, he was only one of
five men in his company who survived.  Scarcely twenty-two with a few years
of war behind him, he returned to his base in England and  married his
English girlfriend after the whirlwind romances common in wartime. Within
three years,  the couple had moved to a small town In Pennsylvania to begin
their married life without the  separation and anxiety of war.

If my father had any of the post-traumatic stress disorder so common to
today's returning troops, he never displayed it or spoke much about his war
experiences. Instead, he chose to settle in his  hometown among a
closely-knit family, raise two children, and enjoy the small pleasures of
everyday  life since one never could take them for granted. Having survived
the war, my father knew all too  well that fate was random and life was to
be cherished - especially when life took some unexpected  turns such as a
daughter who began losing vision in middle age and his doctor confirmed a
diagnosis  of kidney cancer shortly after my father retired. 

Because my family did what loving families do, I offered my father a kidney,
and he told me he wished he could give me his eyes. As it turned out, he was
not able to receive a transplant  and died two years before I became totally
blind and applied for a guide dog from Guiding Eyes for  the Blind. Although
I was sorry to have lost my father as well as all of my light perception, I
was  even sorrier that my father, a life-long dog lover, would never meet my
guide dog or know how much  that dog enhanced my life.

When my first guide dog Boise arrived for home training in 2003, I was told
that her Guiding Eyes  identification tattoo was BB0001; this meant that she
was born into the second litter of puppies  all named with names beginning
with B in the year 2000 and that she was the first-born of her  litter. That
was certainly one way to understand her tattoo, but I realized there was
another far  more important way to interpret it: my father Bill Bennett who
had died on January 1, 2000. BB0001.  I am a woman who, over the years, has
learned to look for and be grateful for signs and omens. As I  stroked
Boise's broad head, I smiled through tears and knew with absolute certainty
that my father, safe from war and illness, had sent me a message through my
dog's tattoo number. He might  not have been able to give me his own eyes,
but my father knew that another creature would provide  the help his
daughter needed.

 

 

 

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