Before we knew quite what was happening and could stop him, my elderly father had climbed up onto a chair to get something out of a kitchen cabinet. The chair tipped over, but all that fell was a clear glass or stein, decorated with predominantly blue winter scenes and three dimensional snow like some of glass ornaments at the Christkindlmarket. We had never seen it before, but miraculously it seemed to be intact. Where was Dad?

I noticed then that the stein had broken into three unevenly sized pieces whose edges were polished instead of having the cloudy look of broken glass edges. I was nearly hysterical because I was afraid for Dad and somehow knew that he was part of the glass. We could restore him if only we knew how.

I appealed to Virgil, but couldn’t tell if he understood me. I went outside into the snowy night to find help, perhaps from the skies or wind or trees.