"Hello, stranger!" I said jokingly into the phone when I saw my daughter's number on the display screen. I had been trying unsuccessfully to reach her several times and was glad she was calling. Then I heard a man's voice asking for Howard! How embarrassing! Quickly getting off the phone after telling him Howard wasn't home, I realized my mistake. The area code was similar, and I hadn't looked at the rest!
Speaking of strangers, my husband seems never to meet one. He had gone about 70 miles away to Enid today with our grandson in regard to an antique tractor's repair. "Are you there yet?" I asked him over the phone. He said yes, they were starting home.
"You'll never believe this!" my excited, extrovert hubby said. He told me the man who waited on him had the same last name as people he used to know in the small town where he grew up. I had heard many times of a Sunday School teacher of that name he had when he was about seven years old. She had made such an impression on him because she always played a ukulele when they sang the children's Bible songs in class.
"She was his aunt!" Howard exclaimed. I'm not sure how he figured this out, but I could imagine the sleuthing, questioning, and genealogy trails he went down to arrive at this joyful discovery! He did say that when he found out the store employee was of the same church denomination in which he himself had grown up, he began to put two and two together. He remembered that the lady of the ukulele was the pastor's wife!
Howard finally got a ukulele when he lay in bed with chicken pox in grade school, and his dad brought him one to pass the time. He has loved it ever since, likely because of the influence of the Sunday School teacher.
Won't it be wonderful in heaven when there will be no strangers, and we will know as we are known! We can imagine harps in heaven, but there may even be ukuleles!
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