A Message from Mike?

So there we were, taking photos of the decorated windows in a store in downtown Kerrville, TX. There were paintings of reindeer, the North Pole, wrapped gifts, and a roaring fire—all examples of winter themes.

It wasn’t until I took a closer look at the last window that I realized there was more to these paintings than just winter.

A lot more.

Every Christmas, two of our best friends, Mike and Cindy, open their beautiful home for an evening of conversation and good cheer between themselves and several of their friends.

I had just heard from Mike the day before seeing these paintings in the store windows. And then, here was this figure with “Mike” on his shirt beckoning to me. Was it some psychic message? Some cyber transmission too advanced to be explained?

A closer look at the figure did not diminish the eerie connection. For those regular readers (OK, occasional readers—reader) who know Mike, can you see the similarity? Well, maybe not the hat—I’ve only seen that a couple of times myself. But how about the physical features? To me there’s a couple of marked similarities, but then again I may be mistaken. Although, . . . .

We continued our walk through the historic district of Kerrville, passing the windows of the shops in the former Fawcett Building. Built in 1907, it was the home of the Fawcett Furniture Company until the mid 1970s. But as we walked along the windows of what is now an antiques store, I couldn’t get the image of “Mike” out of my mind. Was he beckoning to me . . . or just expounding in a somewhat animated fashion on the virtues of red vs. white wine?

The scene of the people dining alfresco reminded us of the party that we would miss this year. As much as we are enjoying new sights, sounds, and tastes, we miss the familiar laughter of good friends.

This reference to Mike and Cindy represent the feelings we have for all our friends and family members that we will be thinking of and missing this year.