When I was working in the hospital, I met a wonderful, bubbly lady, Theresa who became a good friend to me. We would chat when we could and she shared an astonishing real life story with me.
Like her mom, who has passed away, Theresa is a cookie maker, especially for Christmas. Theresa’s specialty is sugar cookies which she loves to make, decorate artfully with skill and wrap in beautiful packages to share with physicians and coworkers she works with as well as friends and family. Over the years Theresa has collected many cookie cutters and stamps for the thousands of cookie creations she has artistically made.
This is the amazing perhaps Christmas Miracle story she shared with me.
Theresa made a big batch of sugar cookies over the course of a few days and on Saturday her plan was to spend the day decorating them all. This took some time and a great deal of effort and energy as she is a perfectionist ensuring her intricate icing decoration and sprinkles that perfected her popular cookies were as good as her mom’s and worthy of presenting to others as a gift.
As Theresa completed a tray of cookies, she needed to put them somewhere to dry and set up. Since every available counter and table space was full of bowls of coloured icing and the utensils she was using, she took the cookie tray out to the garage and looked for a safe place to put them. She spied a perfect spot, the tonneau cover that covered the box of her husband’s half-ton truck. Back inside the kitchen,
Theresa began putting everything away, cleaning the kitchen and washing the dishes when the phone rang. Since Theresa was busy, her husband answered the phone in the other room. With the kitchen cleaned and everything back in place, she went out to the garage to retrieve her cookies so she could begin to package them for gift-giving. To her surprise and dismay, the truck was gone and so were her cookies!
Theresa began to panic and agonize about where the cookies were; all her hard work for not! What Theresa didn’t know was that her son had called and asked his dad for a ride and to come pick him up. Dad had no clue that the cookies were on the back tonneau cover, as hopped in the truck and went to pick up their son. Theresa was devastated and in tears when her husband and son returned and walked into the kitchen. When they saw her in tears and asked what was wrong. She could hardly speak but they managed to hear her say cookies, truck, garage, gone, between tears. All three went out to the garage to have a look at the truck and when they looked on the back of the tonneau cover there the cookies sat, untouched and safe. Theresa’s husband had driven on Territorial Drive where the speed was 80 km and the cookies remained in place unharmed.
Theresa was so relieved and as she concluded her story I had shivers going down my spine and tears in my eyes. Theresa is so passionate about her sugar cookies and she was very relieved they were safely back home again. I told Theresa her mom was looking down from heaven and protecting the sugar cookies that Theresa had worked so hard to create.
A few years later, I was shopping at our local grocery store and spied Theresa in the distance. As my shopping cart neared Theresa, I said to her, “I sure hope your sugar cookies are made.” Well, we both laughed, put out our arms and gave each other a hug. It felt so good to see Theresa again and reminisce about her sugar cookie adventure. She told me that she only makes sugar cookies for her immediate family now as they require a lot of work. She told me that she and her son had just made a batch of jam jams and that is another separate exciting Christmas story for another time.
If you see Theresa this holiday season, give her a hug and wish her a merry Christmas as she is a wonderful lady and she gives a genuine, heartfelt hug.
Merry Christmas Christmas from Cheryl toTheresa
