I didn’t understand, at first, that the real miracle wasn’t who sent it, but how quickly I let it stitch my panic back together. I saw my mother’s looping script, the easy reassurance in every line, and chose belief over doubt because belief hurt less. The dates, the phrasing, the eerie precision of its arrival—none of it mattered as much as the way my lungs finally remembered how to work. The postcard became a pause button on my fear, a sanctioned delay before whatever answer waited on the other side of the phone, or the door, or the worst-case scenario my mind kept rehearsing.

Now, when I take it from the box, its edges softened by years, it feels less like a message from beyond and more like proof of what we’ll do to keep ourselves intact. We borrow voices, invent timing, accept small, impossible mercies. Some mysteries never resolve; they simply sit with us in the dark, offering just enough comfort to make it to morning.