Forget the gift cards

As my father planned his birthday party, family and friends began to wonder. What do you give a man for his 90th birthday?

He already had six of everything stashed away in closets and drawers. He had tools in his garage that he no longer had the strength to use. He had more shirts than he could ever hope to wear. Aside from doctor’s appointments and weekly trips to the grocery store, where would he wear a new shirt and who would even notice?

As the day drew nearer, I often wondered if the party would actually happen. His health was not good. His world was shrinking, with naps filling more and more hours of the day. On good days, he would slowly shuffle to the mailbox, only to find bills, catalogues and the occasional sweepstakes offer. On bad days, even the sweepstakes offers sat unopened.

But he persisted. This was only the second birthday party he ever had, the last one being when he was five, and he was as excited as any five year old might be. He invited everyone he knew. Neighbors. His barber. The mail lady. Planning the party energized him. It gave him something to look forward to. He said he didn’t want presents. Just having everyone there would be good enough. Of course no one would pay attention to that. What’s a party without presents? But what do you give a 90 year old man?

Dad’s 90th birthday party was a big success. He filled an entire room at the local Olive Garden. Not a bad showing for someone who had outlived his wife and many of his relatives and friends. He laughed and joked and raised a glass of iced tea to toast his guests and thank them all for coming. It was the happiest, and most energized, I had seen him in ages. The only thing that would have made it better would have been if my mother had lived long enough to share in his big day.

We spent the next morning opening cards, most of which contained gift cards to his favorite restaurants. He stacked the gift cards next to his recliner and then he napped.

The days following his party returned to his usual routine of sitting on his front porch, watching his small corner of the world go by. Friends returned to their normal routines as well. The phone rarely rang. He dozed in his recliner. With nothing to look forward, most days were merely a carbon copy of the day before. And then, six weeks after his birthday bash, his heart gave out and Dad was gone.

Clearing out your parents’ home is never easy. Emotions run high as memories flow from each photo, each trinket found tucked away in drawers and closets. But the thing that hit me the hardest, and stopped me dead in my tracks, was the pile of restaurant gift cards from his birthday party. They were still stacked next to his phone, as if waiting for an invitation to share a meal with a friend.

I remembered the joy on his face as he had looked around the room at his friends. I could hear the excitement in his voice as they reminisced about old times. And I wished that joy could have continued beyond that one evening, before everyone retreated to life as usual. I suppose he could have picked up the phone and invited one of them to join him for lunch. But he was the sort of man who left the social calendar up to my mother and when she died, his socializing died with her.

I learned an important lesson that day. I decided that when I reach for a gift card to send to a friend, I will resist. Instead, I will make a date to meet for lunch, or dinner, or even just for drinks, so that we can reconnect and share a laugh or two. We are all so busy in our own lives but there are things too important to let slip away. From now on, I resolve to give the gift of time, because time is the greatest gift of all. There never seems to be enough time and yet, in the eloquent words of Joni Mitchell:

“Don’t it always seem to go, that you don’t know what you’ve got till its gone?”