The Gift
I never really knew it was mine, or that it even existed. Like so many things in life it can be in us, around us, or even waiting for us, but until we become aware that it is ours and start to own it, it has no life of it’s own. It stays dormant like a left over Christmas present under the tree, because the recipient never came to the party. A jumper never worn, a toy never played with, a book never read. Or maybe they did collect the gift, or it was sent to them yet they never opened the wrapping, to explore how it could enhance their lives. How often when someone’s house is cleared out are unused items found? Maybe even gifts bought for oneself remained unused. The dress never worn, the picture never hung, or a bottle of perfume that by the time it was opened no longer had the fragrance it was intended to have. All these are wasted gifts.
But the gift I speak of is not the kind you physically unwrap. It’s one that comes with you when you are born. It may get discovered early in life or lay hidden for many years. We can these days, if one is so inclined, see numerous video clips on YouTube of child protégés. Violinists, pianists, gymnasts, all vie with one another to gain the most number of likes and shares, the younger the child the more our enthusiasm for their performance.
I
Others who have probably had their gift from just such an early age fail to get any recognition, or at least only a limited amount until they have almost given up believing that it would ever be recognised, unless they are unusually persistent, like one Susan Boyle showed herself to be. Achieving fame and recognition in middle age and without hardly any of the attributes that usually are part of the package that accompany the gift in a modern young singer. But the gift won through, as it should. Not just to achieve fame or fortune but that the gift was not wasted.
A gift can be a means to an end. A gift can provide an income. A gift can achieve satisfaction and enjoyment. Gifts are as diverse and numerous as their recipients.
My parents were gifted. A cabinet filled with cups and medals showed my father’s excellence is his chosen sport. The lovely clothes I wore as a child despite clothes rationing testified to my mother’s excellence with a needle. She upholstered chairs, decorated rooms as well as having a brain as sharp as the needle she used. I followed in none of these attributes. Neither did I follow my siblings. I neither excelled in art or music.
I feel guilty about the amount of money my parents paid out over five years of music lessons and yet still my hands failed to work together to produce the sounds expected.
Not that my parents didn’t try to encourage me to pursue what they thought would lead to excellence.
Music lessons lingered on for five years, trips to athletic meetings and training nights filled many an evening but never enthused or inspired me.
All the while I was as unaware as they were that what I enjoyed could be a gift. Nobody took any notice when I organised the children in our road to produce a magazine. It was all about their pets, why I chose that I do not know. I didn’t even have one or want one! But as the other children collected the pictures I wrote the text. I organised them. One mother even came and thanked my mother that I kept the children occupied during the school holidays. Mother never even thought about how somewhere in that activity at 11 yrs old, there could be the seeds of a gift that could be developed for my future life.
Maybe it was too fluid to be defined even in my mind. Being able to organise, to lead, inspire and encourage did not seem definable next to a beautiful painting produced by one of my brothers, or the exquisite bridesmaids dresses made for war time weddings by my mother. Also a shyness that developed in my teens acted as a cloak that hid these embryonic gifts.
Yet they remained, emerging a little more boldly as the years advanced. The thrill of running a hospital ward with both it’s mundane and drama. Leading a church with the person who was the most special one in my life, seeing how gifts could compliment one another. Pioneering a women’s ministry. Rejoicing again that my gifts were not ones that
worked in isolation but needed the gifts of others to get the full benefit they were meant to have.
Yet there was another gift that had been in that 11yr old. Or more a desire that did not know that it was a gift. The desire to write. Occasionally that gift would pop it’s head above the parapet, two published articles. The offer from a publisher to write a book.
And now a collection of short stories. But still a gift that never reached it’s full potential for so many reasons.
But who knows that maybe these octogenarian years will be the ones when the other gifts no longer needed as before will make space for it to thrive and flourish.
Because a gift should never be wasted.
