As Day Sixty-Eight ends, there is a surprise for Jenny that I’ve been working on for awhile with some of her closest friends. This evening will be Jenny’s Christmas Gathering, hosted at the Riverview Health Center itself, for friends and coworkers who live in the same city.

As the afternoon went by I was busy preparing the room for the gathering and as I was moving things around some of her closest friends arrived and began to help me decorate which I was very thankful for. Before I knew it, more of her coworkers and friends began coming in. It was time to bring Jenny in for her surprise.

As I wheeled Jenny in through the double wooden doors, the amount of happy screams and noises reached a decibel point of nearly having my body automatically react to covering my ears but as I had both hands on the wheelchair to push her I could not. In total there were 20 people who visited throughout the evening. What an absolute honor that twenty different people took time out of their own days to come here and spend a moment with Jenny. There were many tears of joy and laughter throughout the evening. I was always aware to watch Jenny carefully incase her brain got overloaded but as the evening went on Jenny was having such a great time I could also relax a little and enjoy the evening. One of the funniest stories was trying to see who Jenny could remember. One coworker had just gone through labor a few days back and still came to see Jenny. She went up to her and stated she had just delivered a baby and still came here specifically for today just to see her and that Jenny better remember her for all her troubles. Jenny could not remember her, and the room erupted in laughter. Many, many photos were taken throughout the evening but as I do not have express consent from everyone there is only one I found I can post here.

As this is such a joyous occasion with lots of food, here’s a picture of some of the food from the gathering.

As the evening winded down and everyone started leaving, I had one more announcement to make but did not want to say it at the beginning of the gathering as I feel it would’ve changed the dynamic of it.

Today also happened to be my birthday but I did not want everyone to know until the end of the evening as I wanted this gathering to be all about Jenny and nothing else. So as individual guests were leaving I spoke with them one on one revealing it was also my birthday and that seeing all of them take time out of their own lives to show up today to share a warm, holiday memory with Jenny was the best birthday gift they could’ve given me.