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Memories of Christmas: Christmas joy came with a visit from her son

Judith Rolfs says her son brings with him the spirit of Christmas whenever he visits. Terry Mayer/staff.

Editor's note - Writer Margaret Plevak has found some of the magic of the season, from the carols on the radio and the twinkling lights throughout the neighborhood to the pageants held on elementary school stages.

Each day this week on WalworthCountyToday.com, we'll publish a favorite Christmas Memory from a Walworth County resident. Read all the memories in Walworth County Sunday HERE.

Judith Rolfs, Fontana author, speaker and marriage and family counselor: On Dec. 25, 1985, we arrived around 9 a.m. at Lakeland Nursing Home in Elkhorn with song sheets and homemade gifts and cards. It had been our custom for more than 10 years, since our children were toddlers, to visit residents in the quiet of Christmas morning, even though we didn’t have family there. My husband Wayne and I wanted our four to experience the joy of ministering to others.

But that year, our 18-year-old son, David, had overslept. He’d been treated for lymphoma since October, and was mobile, but fragile. We left him home in bed.

As we worked our way down from the top floor, I’ll never forget stepping from the elevator and seeing David with a semi-circle of silver-haired ladies listening attentively to his reading of “The Night Before Christmas.” He’d driven over late, rather than miss our visit. I paused as my heart leaped with a mother’s love, then closed my eyes and prayed, “Lord, may our precious son’s life continue.”

The very next week, David was hit by a drunken driver while jogging, and his leg was shattered. It would seem our prayers had not been answered, but we clung to faith and trust in God.

After several leg surgeries for David, with cancer raging through his body, a new experimental procedure at the University of Wisconsin-Madison Hospital — a bone marrow transplant — was suggested, and ultimately succeeded.

David and his wife Kathy and their 6-year-old twins, Joshua and Anna, will soon visit us from Florida. On Christmas morning, we’ll be at another nursing home with his brother Dan and Dan’s wife Stephanie, to continue our legacy of bringing Christmas joy to God’s precious elderly. We’ll celebrate Jesus, for in him and through him all things are possible.

Monday Karen Schlichter, Fairest of the Fair.

Read other memories of Christmas from local residents in the Dec. 20, 2009 e-edition of Walworth County Sunday, HERE.