While it may seem that we, up here in the northern-most part of the northern hemisphere, spend most of our days between November and March in a haze in which every day is like the one before and that we only come alive when we finally see the sun again, with a little effort, you can see tiny miracles almost every day. 

Today was one of those days. 

I could feel it was a special day from the moment I woke up. Usually, I’m the second in the family to get up – third, if you count Dog – but this morning, I got up first. I told Wife she could stay in bed a little while longer, and went to wake up Dog who was still fast asleep on the second floor landing. 

I went downstairs, put on the kettle, boiled a couple of eggs, picked up the newspaper from the mailbox, all of this completely normal, nothing out of the ordinary at all. 

I took some toast out, another loaf of bread, sliced it, then picked up cheese, ham, cucumber from the fridge. And  finally, I grabbed the box of liver pate spread. It’s not something we always have at home, but for some reason that I can’t explain, I had bought one just the day before. 

Five minutes later, the rest of the family came downstairs, first Wife, then Daughter, then Son. I made a sandwich, took a cup of tea and spread the newspaper’s sports section in front of me on the kitchen table.

Oddlyt enough, I didn’t take any of the liver pate spread, but the thought had crossed my mind. As I deliberated about sandwich choices, in the end, I decided to have some on my second sandwich a little later. Who knows what would have happened had I reversed the order of my sandwiches.

That we’ll never know, but we do know what happened next. 

This:

Wife took a slice of toast from the bag and moved three steps to her left to make her sandwich. Daughter was already standing there, making her sandwich. Son was two steps to the right of Daughter, making his sandwich decisions. 

Then Wife grabbed the liver pate spread. She opened the plastic lid, and what happened next made our jaws drop. Even Dog’s. 

It was a magical moment, like the one eight years ago when my toast popped out of the toaster and landed on top of it, standing upright, making a perfect landing.

Wife held the lid in her hand, with the block of spread stuck on it, leaving the entire box empty!

“Wow, that’s a first. I’ve never seen that before,” Wife said. 

And that’s how we’ll remember January 10, 2020. A magical day.