I am sitting in my parents' home alone. They have gone from the farm to a nearby town. I am 13 years old and I am watching television.
We do not have much, never did. And yet, we never lacked for the necessities. I never went hungry or poorly dressed. I was happy, loved, with great parents who had given birth to me in their early 40's. I no doubt was a surprise to them, but a welcomed one. My parents loved each other, enjoyed a comfortable home, were in generally good health, well-fed, with many friends and family members. They were certainly not rich materially but seem to have everything that counted.
I heard the car drive onto the graveled driveway of our home and did not pay much attention to it since it was expected. The kitchen door opened and I heard my mother's footsteps as she walked through to the family room where I was sitting. She had a certain look on her face that revealed more than normal, but it was not readily discernible.
She said, "Daddy wants you to help him outside."
I rose from the couch, walked passed her and on through the kitchen onto the back porch. I could hear her following me as I walked, which was odd.
As I opened the screen door of the porch toward the driveway and car, I saw my Dad bringing from the back seat of the car the most perfect new bicycle ever made. You must understand that most of us farm boys either had no bike, or a broken down and rusted single speed. And yet, here in my Dad's hand, just now being rolled onto the ground, was a black and silver 3-speed racing bike with turned-down handlebars and skinny tires! No one in my experience had ever dreamed of, much less possessed, such a gift.
To this day, it is something of a miracle to me that my poor parents would be able to both afford and select such a perfect bike. This is the single greatest gift, accompanied by the greatest emotional impact and joyous surprise, I have ever received, or will ever receive.
Certainly, it was purchased at some recreation shop for probably no more than $70 in 1964. Not a trivial amount but not unusually excessive either. Yet, were it to have cost a thousand times as much, I could not have been pleased one bit greater.
I was totally surprised, the gift was completely unexpected, and could not have been even imagined as possible. And now, here it was suddenly in my hand, given out of love for a son.
God, help me one day to just once overwhelm with sheer joy one other human being.
