Rosita

My Sarah kept looking out the window at the ever deepening snow. Tree limbs were weighted down and power lines sagged to the breaking point. She knew we could survive quite well without electricity except for not having a telephone. Should we lose electrical power, there would be no way to recharge the cell phone battery. Our daily communication with Luke, Mary, and Sarah’s daughter would be completely cut off except for absolute emergencies.
The family stayed on the telephone with Sarah off and on all of that day; mostly they talked about Payton and me. I wasn’t sure, but I thought they steered away from talking about our not being together on Christmas so that Payton and I would not be sad. I didn’t know about Payton, but if they’d had any idea of my original concerns about all of those people, they wouldn’t have given their absence a second thought. If Payton was missing any of them, she was doing a fine job of hiding it.
When we looked out the window one last time before complete darkness settled in, the snow had stopped falling and the sky was covered with stars. I had never seen them shine so brightly. Sometime during late afternoon the clouds apparently had begun to move away and we had been too busy to notice. My Sarah breathed a sigh of relief.
As three of us stood at the window and looked out over the snow-covered landscape, daylight was fading and it seemed as if we were the only beings on earth.
Stillness and quiet had settled over the Old House. Once again this aged home had stood while storms raged around her. Once more she had done her job of protecting the family within her walls, just as she had done for almost a hundred years. I couldn’t keep from wondering where her endurance came from. Then I felt that sense of comfort flood over me, stronger than ever before. Another year had passed and it was now Christmas Eve at the old House; her family had come home and she was at peace.