Family's Greatest Wish

And in that flash of an instant, when I glimpsed as they wished, the portrait of my family never looked more beautiful.

The Best

It was the best of times.

My wife and I and our two little daughters are on a Disney family vacation. Coming back from dinner we pass through the hotel lobby where a sparkling fountain adorns the center square. The four of us stand together in front of the shining pool. Each with a coin in our hand, we shut our eyes, we make our wishes, and throw the coins in. I peek just in time to see all four coins hit the water simultaneously. The serendipity amused me—four tiny splashes at precisely the same moment in perfect sync.

I glance their way, “Did you see that?!”

They had not. Instead, I caught a split-second glimmer of my wife and two precious little girls transfixed with heads bowed and eyes closed silent and still in mid-wish. And in that flash of an instant, when I glimpsed as they wished, the portrait of my family never looked more beautiful.

The Wish Thing

The Wish thing started at the kitchen table as birthday folklore nothing more. Then I don’t know when the fountain wishes sprung. It seemed the girls couldn’t pass a cascade of water without beseeching Mom and Dad for pocket change to cast a newly minted wish. Pennies would never do. It had to be silver. The bigger the coin the better. My children were always high-class wishers!

Standard instructions applied:

"Make a wish and be sure to blow out all the candles. Oh, and don’t tell anyone your wish or it won’t come true. Got it, good!"

The girls got it all right.

In a home that was neither religious nor superstitious, they embraced the wish thing with awe and determination. Even as tiny toddlers their behests were more like sacred reflections with an imaginary Spirit of Wishes. And the prospect of their lofty dreams coming true sparked the same childhood wonder about what Santa Claus is gonna bring this year while counting down the calendar from forty days till Christmas!

Yes, they believed in Santa too for a while there. I grew up Catholic, their mom is Jewish. The girls cleaned up in December between Hanukkah and Christmas. They thought the Easter Bunny was a bit far fetched though. The children are no fools. That fuzzy little varmint looks different every time. And my wife nixed the idea of angles early on. Instead she told the kids that people really evolved from special monkeys. Not sure what one has to do with other. But I digress.

Wish It Now!

Yes, of course as responsible parents and serious adult people we mused the superstition. Nevertheless, it was a wonderful thing to watch our little girls covet their aspirations with faith so pure. We learned some goodness there. We taught our kids to never deny their hearts’ desires. And, in turn, our children taught us how to wish again. So we came to value the tradition.

Credible magical request were serious business in our house! Thus emerged our family formula for all ages—pretend a trance; but yearn with true conviction. And so we do. Call it mysticism or prayer. But our entreaty is genuine and we aim to make our bidding count.

What do you wish above all other dreams?

Wish it now!

Brief Shining Moment

Of course that was child's play. It has been been over 20 years since I captured that precious glance of my wife and children wishing at the fountain. So much has happened since. I was long separated and ultimately divorced. The kids, of course, are very grown up people now. Prospering on their own and chasing bigger dreams. I hope so. I miss them awful. It seemed, for a long time, that I didn’t get my wish.

But I did that day. Oh how I treasure the act of wishing in that crystal moment! When together with my family our hearts enjoined our dreams and the entire world seemed perfect. I have that precious memory forever emblazoned in my mind.

No matter where I am or what I do I will always carry the heartfelt joy of that brief shining moment.

.

Always.

PS: I kind of do believe in angels. There are two somewhere out there right now who many years ago taught this wayward daddy that dreams really do come true.