Gift

Today is our wedding anniversary. My wife gave me a gift that touched me to tears.

She woke up at 6am yesterday to finish the gift. However, she was unable to complete it. It was so last minute that she had to complete it late at night. She then gave it to me at 12 midnight. Although it was quite a task for my wife, I was completely oblivious of her intention.

I woke up at 7am by the noise of the alarm clock. In my blurred awakening, I saw my wife scrambling into the room telling me to carry on sleeping. Without any queries or suspicions, I more than willing went back to sleep. (She was actually making the gift and she was afraid that I might find out.)

I finally woke up at 10am. My wife told me that she wanted to develop some photographs before breakfast and told me to wait for her at our car after I had washed up.

At night, about 8.30pm, while we were at my parents’ place, she wanted me to go and collect the photographs. We reached the developer at 9pm. The developer was about to retire for the day.

When we reached home, I took the bath first, while my wife kept herself busy with “something”.

At 12 midnight, she gave me the gift. When I ripped the wrapping paper to pieces, I saw the cover of a sketch book. I thought she knew that I liked to draw and had given me a sketch book to express my unappreciated artwork. When I opened the book, I discovered that it was actually a photo album. As I flipped through the pages, it unfolded our past, our rocky journey of plenty of ups and downs together.

At the end of the album, my eyes were moist. The effort and the meaning behind the gift was simply beyond the description of words.

I love you, Darling.