My first Rosary.
I remember
a salesman that had come in our home to sell devotional objects, and my mother
had purchased several items including two rosaries,a pink and a blue made of
crystal like faceted beads. When asked who they were for she told me that I
would get mine on a special day. I was hoping to get the pink one because, in
those days, the color pink was girls and blue for boys.
My First Communion Day arrived and as a
present I received the blue As I'm writing thing, seven days before me
sixtieth birthday, I still have my blue Rosary, but my sister lost hers when she
was a teenager, she told me.
When I was in my 20's, while
praying the Rosary using my Rosary beads, I suddenly realized that, the color
blue signifies the color used in images of Mother Mary's clothes, for example,
the image of Our Lady Of Grace, my special image of Mother Mary. Since that day
my Rosary became ever more special to me.
Then in my fifties the metal
Crucifix, the Jesus figure, began to break at the feet's rivet. Then the rivet
broke, leaving the feet of the Jesus figure was loose, with continued use still,
last, the Cross itself broke in two because of over use. I Crazy glued it many
times, scotch taped, as you can see, even used hot waxed,it always broke at the
same areas. Last the first layer of the Cross was seperating from the second
layer so I tied those with a wire wrap, then last the Cross itself broke where
the cross beam connects with the upright beam.
Knowing that my
Rosary really needed a new Crucifix I started to look around for a new one that
was about the same size and couldn't find one close that size. Then one summer
my husband and I had gone on our yearly pilgrimage to Ste. Anne de Beaupré's
Shrine in Québec, Canada and found and purchased a black and silver Crucifix. I
was certain that it was the perfect size but it was too big. I had decided to
put it on any way, but, didn't do it right then because it wasn't a "right fit",
and was way too thick, so I kept putting it off.
In the winter time, a year
or so after I had purchased that thick Crucifix, my husband and I had gone on a
weekend shopping spree in a city, four hours drive from home, where all the
malls are, and the last night there we had gone to the Sam's Club store and we
were walking back to our vehicle with our purchases in the shopping cart. The
parking lot was very slushy and had icy spots here and there. I was looking on
the ground not to step in muddy slush, or on ice. A vehicle was passing leaving
the parking lot and I didn't want to be sprayed with slush, for it was spraying
as it was coming closer to us, and so we moved closer to the parked vehicles,
and was watched my steps, the lights of the vehicle shone on something on the
ground and as I made another step I saw it was goldish. Yes in the slush I could
see gold, so I stopped to look at it first, because, I didn't want to dirty my
hand with slush, so I bent down more to see better and there in the slush was a
little gold cross shape. I voiced out loud, "Oh my GOD!" I bent down and dug it
out from the slush and whiped off the mud a little, and, it was a whole gold
Crucifix, real gold. As I examined it closer I saw it was the almost exact copy
as a gold chain and Crucifix my husband had bought me, there as Sam's Club, for
a Christmas gift a few years back, a very close resemblance it looked like. I
couldn't believe I had found it and I was esctatic.
I voiced out loud, "Oh my GOD,
this is a "Crucifix" and people, and cars have been trampling on it for who
knows how long. How can people trample on a Crucifix and leave it there on the
ground, in the slush, for that matter? I can't believe people can be so non
caring! Look, it's just like this one", showing my husband my chain I was
wearing with the same Crucifix.
When in our vehicle and driving
away, it then dawned on me, "this is the perfect
Crucifix to replace the broken one on my
little Rosary!!!" I said out loud. "Oh my GOD! PAPA DIEU!!! You found a Crucifix
for me, oh my GOD. This is the perfect size for my Rosary and I've been looking
everywhere to find one for years and here I find one in the muddy slush, and
plus it's in real gold!!!" It seemed too much for me to get such a free gold
CRUCIFIX GIFT.
Once home I polished it and saw
that it had been trampled so much that the edges all around it were not smooth
to the touch any longer, especially the four corners. Some areas are sharp a
little from being pressed on the muddy slush gravel. Who knows how long it was
in that parking lot? But, the Jesus figure and fancy etchings are not broken at
all. "It is too good to be true!", I still say today.
I replaced my broken Crucifix
with this one at once when we arrived back home that same day and my Rosary is
still under my pillow, like I have been placing it since my First Communion
Day.
I thought I had lost my Rosary when I had to go live in
Montréal, Canada when I had to go care for my niece and nephew when I was
fifteen years old, but, when I was preparing to get married and was moving my
belongings in our appartment, I found it in one of my jewelry containers. I
remember I was so happy of having found it I was jumping up and down in the
apartment, I remember so well, and I put it back where it belonged, under my
pillow, and it's been there (pillows ssssss)ever since that
day.
