“You know, Jill, the good book tells us to be nice to widows for a reason,” my roommate said when I got home after a long day of helping dear little old ladies sort out their husbands’ estates. “Lots of them have money with no one to leave it to!”
My roommate was a genuine Christian and a kind and generous woman. How could she ever say such a thing? She laughed when she saw the horrified look on my face! “Gotcha!” she said. She certainly had. “You needed a good laugh,” she said.
I liked my job as a probate paralegal, and I did work with a lot of widows. I enjoyed helping take care of the practical, financial side of grief so they could deal with their emotions. I also loved the stability my job gave me: The overtime pay came in handy. But loving my job wasn’t the reason I stayed late at the office, and piles of paperwork wasn’t the reason either.
The truth was, at 23 years old, I’d already gotten into more than my share of trouble. Too much alcohol and too many inappropriate romantic entanglements had made me skittish about being social. All the mistakes I’d made proved that I didn’t deserve a fulfilling life. I’d lost faith in myself. I wasn’t smart enough or good enough for happiness. If I tried to get it I’d just mess up again. It was safer to hide out at work.
The next morning I went to my boss’ office to meet a new client. Thelma Vaughan couldn’t have been more than 4 feet, 8 inches tall. Despite the fact that her husband had just died, her bright red lips and rosy cheeks were wearing a smile. I glanced at her file. Seventy-five? I thought. I wouldn’t have guessed it.
“My husband died of a heart attack,” Mrs. Vaughan explained. “But I was lucky to get as much time with him as I did.”
“What a nice thought,” I said.
“I can tell we’re going to like each other,” Mrs. Vaughan said. “Please think of me as Aunt Thelma. Anyone sweet enough to help little old ladies like me can call me aunt.”
Aunt Thelma and I had a lot of work to do on her case. We got right down to business. When my stomach growled, I looked up at the clock. Two hours had passed! I could only barely make out Thelma’s gray bun peeking up from the pile of papers. “How in the world do you keep all these forms and deadlines and rules straight in your pretty little head?” Thelma asked. “It just shows how smart you are.”
“Well, I’ve worked here a while now,” I said. “I guess that proves anyone can learn this job if they do it long enough.”
“Hogwash,” Thelma announced. “You’re a bright young lady, and you’ve got a bright future ahead.”
That night at home I lay in bed thinking about Thelma’s prediction. It was true: All those papers and deadlines and rules could be intimidating. I remembered how nervous I’d been my first week on the job. But now it really did feel rather effortless. I’d always chalked it up to experience, but Aunt Thelma thought otherwise. Did she have a point? The impossible thought came and went over the next few days.
The following week Thelma and I had a date to get some appraisals done on her jewelry. I couldn’t wait to see her. “What did you do for a living when you worked?” I asked as we drove to the appraiser.
“Well, I wanted to attend college and become a schoolteacher. But there was no money in our poor family for education,” Thelma said.
“What a disappointment for you.”
“Oh, but I haven’t finished the story!” Thelma went on. “Years later, after Harold and I were married, I had the opportunity to teach bookkeeping to unwed mothers. It became my life’s work. Now isn’t that something? I wanted to become a teacher, and God made me one. He loves to give you special surprises like that. I think it gives God and the angels something to giggle about! There are a lot of special surprises awaiting a young girl like you. A whole lifetime of them. Just wait and see.”
A whole lifetime of them, I thought. Could that be true even for someone like me? Someone who’d already made so many mistakes? I hadn’t thought so, but Aunt Thelma seemed to be so sure of it. Could I stop looking backward and focus on the life God had waiting for me? It was a whole new way of thinking!
Thelma and I got to know each other pretty well over the next few months. Every time we got together I felt a little bit different after we parted. A little smarter, a little happier, a little more hopeful about the future. Instead of burying myself in work all the time, I got out with my roommate and met some of her friends. I realized I’d forgotten what it was like to have fun. Good, clean fun without regrets.
Once Thelma and I finished tying up the loose ends of her husband’s estate, she insisted on remaining my aunt. We went to lunch, shopped the mall, and sat in the little common room of her assisted-living facility and talked. Thelma liked to knit. “Forget about all the wrong men from the past,” Thelma said one afternoon, her fingers busy working the needles and yarn. “God has someone waiting for you who will love you the way you deserve to be loved.”
By the time I had to move away for work I almost believed Thelma’s dreams for my life. We promised to keep close through the mail. We wrote regularly. Then the letters stopped coming. I called the director of her assisted-living facility and got the news I’d been dreading: Thelma had passed away.
“I was lucky to get as much time with her as I did,” I said as I hung up the phone. How far she had taken me. From an unhappy, insecure girl of 23 to a woman who believed wholeheartedly that God had good things in store for me, despite my past.
As Thelma predicted, I did meet the man of my dreams. My “aunt” had restored my faith in myself and my faith in love. When I gave both another try, I came out a winner. I guess my old roommate was right: The widows I worked with did have a lot of riches to share. But they weren’t the kind of riches you keep in a bank account. Thelma shared with me something much more important: the wisdom of a lifetime, and the gift of true friendship.
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