Two year and 8 days ago the world lost of great human being, the American actor Kristoff St. John.

Kristoff played the role of Neil Winters. Neil was the father of Lily, as played for over ten years by the fantastic Christel Khalil.

In a scene in episode 64, Billy Abbott, played by the Emmy Award winning Jason Thompson, leaves the offices of ChanceComm where he works alongside Lily. He gets a call from Victoria Newman, as played by Amelia Heinle, that as a co-parent, the kids Katie and Johnny were eager to see him as Victoria was in a good place to meet Billy in his new place, as a man no longer driven by hatred, most of which is based in the grief of losing his daughter Deliah.

Enthusiastically, Billy said, “Three pint-sized V.I.P.’s who want a hug from their daddy!,” leaving Lily to reflect on not only Cane’s absence from her family’s lives but more harshly as his tragice death in real life still shakes anyone who knew anything about him. She smiles wryly away from Billy, and we got to see her desk with one photo in a frame. That photo features Kristoff and Christel in character.

Also excellent in episode 64 is Peter Bergman as Jack Abbott, Jr. As he remiscinses on the last year with his mother Dina Mergeron played by Marla Adams in the “most important role [she] ever had the privilege to play.” He flashes back, and he could have played the scene very quiet and cool, letting the memorial clip do all the work of showing the Christmastime nostalgia featured on this December 21, 2020, season appropriate show. Instead he acts in a way that is reminiscent of Jack NIcholson in The Pledge. Strong, committed to the truth yet empaths.

The whole sense of how a photo in a frame as Lily has, and the power of that photo to evoke emotions of mixed kinds on every level, reminded me of the song by Genesis called Home By The Sea in which, upon reflected on an old family home, through Phil Collins’ vocal say

”

images of sorrow, pictures of delight

Things that go to make up a life
Endless days of summer, longer nights of gloom
Waiting for the morning life
Scenes of unimportance, photos in a frame
Things those go to make up a life”