This weekend Lesh and I helped clean out the last of my mom's things from my childhood home. With my dad's passing in June the house was put on the market in November and tomorrow the sale closes. As I walked through each room my mind was flooded with memories of me and my family. We moved into that house when I was eight years old so most of my childhood memories come from living in that house.
I was recently reunited with some high school girlfriends and they recalled how my house was their second home. I remember my house being the house all the neighborhood kids hung out at and I LOVED that!! In that house I learned how to cook in the kitchen next to my mom, I was taught how to park in my driveway by my dad and so many life lessons learned. That was also the house I ran home to as the prodigal daughter into the arms of my loving and forgiving father. This was the house I used to sit at the dining room table with my dad and talk for hours. This was the house where I came home to tell my dad I had a boyfriend and the house where Lesh went to ask my dad for my hand in marriage. It's the house I walked out of in my wedding dress to meet the man God had matched me with. I could go on and on. I am so thankful for all these memories.
While cleaning out the laundry full of items destined for the trashcan- things unopened, old and dusty items, I came across 2 very old spiral notebooks under a pile of junk. I knew immediately they belonged to my dad. My dad loved to write sermons, scriptures, and songs written by other artists so he could play them on his guitar and its also how he taught himself to speak English. You see my dad used to have a band called the Echo- reflections of early rock. These 2 notebooks have songs written by the Beatles, Keith Richard, Mick Jagger, Box Tops, and many others like them. I found myself smiling as I ruffled through the pages. I flipped some random pages and came across this page.
It says, To: Lesly at the top and marked with the date of my birth month and year. It is a song my dad wrote for me. As I stood in that laundry room tears just streamed down my face. What a treasure to find in the middle of all the turmoil my heart was feeling that day. I remember my dad telling me one time when I was in high school that he wrote me a song, but that I was too young to understand it and that one day he would share it with me. I thank God he led me to it. It is written in Spanish, so I have translated it so you can understand.
It is titled, "Dulce Estrella" or "Sweet Star."
Like a sweet star you arrived today,
and to think that it seemed you would be late.
But the day and heaven united and they created you to shine on our night.
And you gave us flashes of inspiration.
And everything was so sudden, that your light flooded us.
and like a sweet star you arrived when there was only darkness.
Bringing love in your smile and tenderness in your eyes,
Your love you gave us to make us always rich with your light.
Like a sweet star you arrived today.
I hardly have the words to describe how I feel about finding this song. Really I just have tears. So many tears.
But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven,
where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt,
and where thieves do not break through nor steal. Matthew 6:20.
