“There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle.” Albert Einstein

Miracles happen all the time. We are often unaware of them when they happen and only recognize them in retrospect. Sometimes, we fail to notice them all together.

In crisis situations, we hope and pray fervently for miracles to happen instantly. But we are not in contol. They often happen when we least expect them.

The greatest miracle of my life was that I was born into this world with my twin brother. My mother had been told by many doctors that she would be unable to conceive children after the birth of my half-sister, twenty years older.

My mom was orphaned when she was twelve years old. Her mother died giving birth to her fifth child. A few months later, her father died from a broken heart, leaving his young children under the care of an aunt.

My mom was raised in a convent school by nuns. As a young woman, she worked as a receptionist and photo model for a photographer in a small town in the Rhineland of Germany.  She was very beautiful and intelligent. Her kind and cheerful personality attracted people like a magnet.

Unfortunately, there are gaps in her life story. I never knew until I left home to live with Peter in Canada that my sister was only a half-sister. My father had adopted her when he married my mother.

My mother never revealed the name of my sister’s biological father. She only told me that he was engaged to her and died in a motorcycle accident before my sister was born. 

My father loved my sister like his own child. Doctors had told my parents that my mom would be unable to conceive any more children. So they lived happily as a threesome for twenty years, traveling every summer by canoe on all the scenic rivers in Germany. Luckily my father was a terrific photographer, and his beautiful photos survived.

And then the miracle happened. When my mother thought she was in her menopause, she conceived us. On a beautiful Sunday at the end of October, my twin brother and I were born into this miraculous world under a full moon. 

My parents