Page 15 - Holding Hands

Holding Hands
The years began to pass—almost too quickly—and I tried to make time to go back to my hometown to visit my parents and old friends at least once every two or three years. My parents travelled to visit me and my family at least once a year as well.
Whenever I did manage to visit my parents, I would always look for, and would always see, Winston and Adele on their morning walks. I’m not sure exactly why, but it was always comforting and emotionally stabilizing for me to see them in their morning routine—especially when so much was changing in my own life over the years. Yes, much had changed over the years: some for the better, and also some for the worse.
A few decades had passed, and I celebrated my fiftieth birthday with my parents and some old friends that still lived in or near my hometown. My mother invited Winston and Adele to the party and I was delighted to see that they had accepted the invitation.
I stayed with my parents for a few days be- fore heading back to my distant home. I was trav- elling alone since my wife and I had divorced three years earlier.
Each of those days, I was warmed by that old familiar sight of Winston and Adele taking their morning walks. On one of those mornings, I remember smiling sadly to myself as I wondered if I would have been divorced if my wife and I had done what Winston and Adele had done.
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