THOUGHTFUL MOMENTS

On my father’s favorite place, the back patio, my mother, her children, and grands

gathered. We ate dried-up casseroles so we wouldn’t have to cook and could return the dishes.

As we picked through plates of cake, my brother carted a bag of golf clubs into our midst.

Without saying a word, he teed up, grabbed a wood, and whacked the ball into my parents’ pasture.

We all cheered and hooted. When my brother swings a golf club and connects to the ball, it is artistry.

“Who else wants to try?”

I paused from shoving Mrs. Hendrick’s lemon pound cake into my mouth. “You want us to do that?”

“Come on.”

My cake be darned. I needed to whack the bounce out of something. My golf career, the shortest known to mankind, showed teenage promise, until the Sunday the truth of golf in me was revealed. Dad and I were on the ninth hole. His friends showed up.

“Go ahead, honey. Show them what you got.”

Granted, I could smack a golf ball. But Dad had not counted on ratio. For every fine

whack, three dribbles came. I swung, the pressure to perform far heavier than the club. After three tries, one of my dad’s friends ended my misery.

“We all have bad days.” Thus, my golf career came to an end.

Today would be different. This would be in memory of my father. My brother teed up the ball, then handed me the club. I rocked my feet into the soil, prayed for a perfect connection to redeem the day, refute the past. I dug my feet in, poised the club on the ground, but the club head faced backward.

“No, those are Dad’s clubs. Gotta swing left-handed,” my brother said.

“No way.” Every weekend, my father cursed having learned to play left-handed. He

vowed my baby brother, a leftie, would learn to play right. To my dad’s end, he believed left- handed clubs prevented him from perfection.

“Give me a right-hand club.”

“Nope. Left-handed today.”

I looked at the bag. The club covers we’d all seen for years, many times having carted them to Dad’s car. I looked at my brother with appreciation. What a fitting memory to create for our family.

I hit it well enough, which is to say, a dribble and a half. My siblings, nephews, nieces, and spouses, all stepped up to swing at the golf balls my brother teed up. No sacred words were spoken. But Mom smiled. Our family hollered encouragements.

It was a sublime moment no one could craft. The idea popped up in my brother’s mind, and here we were, on the saddest day of our life, golfing left-handed.

It’s sweeping, this grief. We might not feel the gratefulness of unexpected moments now.

But welcome them. If appropriate, share them. The actions might become the greatest gift of the day.

Reprinted from the multi-award winning After the Flowers Die, by Renee Leonard

Kennedy. Available now on her website at reneeleonardkennedy.com .