As I write these words on the 2023 winter solstice, I’m remembering the solstice of 1997.  It’s a treasured memory, coming almost exactly a year after my father died.  Dad was special – a brilliant, courageous, humorous man, a gifted storyteller, a true humanitarian. He was beloved by everyone who knew him. 

I hadn’t appreciated many of these qualities growing up – the exceptions being his humor and storytelling. I think few children appreciate their parents’ true nature until they gain life experience of their own. My father and I became especially close in his last decade of life, as I finally grappled with my own personal issues.

He died on December 23^rd, 1996, just weeks shy of his ninety-third birthday. Grief was my constant companion in the days and weeks that followed. After Dad’s memorial service in mid-January, I brought several boxes of his papers home with me. Going through these boxes helped assuage my grief, and I often sensed him near me during that time. Mom, so distraught at his death, would have had difficulty with this task, so I was helping her also. 

As the months passed my grief lessened, although it didn’t take much to call it up on any given day. But my conservation work occupied my attention on most days. 

At that time, I was helping to protect a large, forested property for local education and recreation. As the end of 1997 approached, we planned a community solstice celebration, to be held at that property. The evening event included a potluck and a sing-along with live musicians.

Several days before the event, I suddenly realized the solstice also marked the coming anniversary of my father’s death. The autumn months had been busy, and Dad had not been in my thoughts as much. 

Just hours before the celebration, I decided to stay home and “talk” to my father by writing in my journal. 

After stoking the fire in the woodstove, I sat in a chair near the Christmas tree, its tiny white lights twinkling. Reaching for my journal on the coffee table, I suddenly noticed the Christmas cactus on a side table and gasped. The plant was covered with beautiful red blooms.

For decades I’ve kept Christmas cactuses in my home, long before they became available in colors other than a Christmasy red. Long-time readers of this blog may remember when I drove the Alaska Highway with my family the last week of December 1974. We were moving to Anchorage. In my box of treasured small houseplants was a vigorous young Christmas cactus, a gift from my father for my new home.

Two days into our Alaska Highway adventure, the temperature began plummeting, eventually reaching -61°. Despite covering my box of houseplants in the daily transfer between car and lodging, the plants were suffering. I finally left them at Johnson’s Crossing Lodge, which had many happy plants in a south-facing dining room window. It especially saddened me to leave Dad’s Christmas cactus behind.

Now, sitting with this stunning blooming Christmas cactus on the winter solstice of 1997, I wept. None of my Christmas cactuses had ever displayed so many beautiful red flowers, nor have I seen such a display since. In the moment, I felt suffused with my father’s love, feeling his loss intensely.

I picked up my pen, opened my journal, and began to write. “Dearest Dad, thank you for visiting me… I’ve missed you so…”