At my father's house

Even before my husband's accident (see yesterday's post), my father had called and left a message.  He'd be out of town this weekend, he reminded me, and he knew that we were expecting guests.  "If you'd like to use my house to entertain," he offered, "it's yours."  We have but one downstairs air-conditioning unit in my own house; yesterday's heat was soaring toward 100 and humidity was pushing the discomfort zone farther.  I try never to impose on anyone, never to take advantage, but this time, I thought, I will say yes.  Once I brought my husband home with a splinted, throbbing hand, there was no question:  We'd get relief at my father's house.

So after a lovely if delayed restaurant lunch with my son, my husband, and our guests, I packed up the appetizers and glassware and drinks I'd purchased earlier in the week, and we set off—my husband's poor hand elevated in the passenger's seat beside me, his cousins and aunt (all three beautiful, for beauty runs deep in this Salvadoran clan) in the back.  I drove into horse country to show off the land I love, the rolling hills of glory.  Up and down the hills, past the old barns and the "Madison County" bridge, past fields high with corn, beneath a dipping sun, we went, and then I turned and headed for my father's house.

Inside, everything was the way my father keeps it—the dozens of rare and gorgeous flowers in bloom on the deep sills, the collections of rare and wonderful things smart on their shelves, the table polished and waiting, the counters spotless.  Outside, the gardens were weedless and the bird feeders were stocked.  In every inch of my father's house, my mother is honored—her affinity for beauty, her curiosity, her standards of care and cleanliness.  I can't explain, really, how much love I feel when I see what my father does, still, for my mother every day—there at their house, or at the cemetery, where he has built for her and maintained a garden.  But I can say that yesterday, in my husband's family, my father's house had its perfect guests—three women who are themselves peaceful and appreciative and dear, three women, who said, in their Spanish-inflected way, "It's really all so beautiful."

Because it is.