Christmas Through a Child's Eyes (12 page)

BY RAYMOND L. ATKINS

F
inancially, it had been a tough year for our family. With Christmas coming, my wife, Marsha, and I were nearing wit's end about how we were going to purchase gifts for our four children. Because of some disappointing Christmases we had experienced as children, it had become important to us to provide a big Christmas for our kids. This year, however, we were going to have to lower our sights. I'd been sick and money was tight. It looked like this was going to be a Christmas of winter coats, socks, and underwear — basic necessities only. There just wasn't any way around it.

The three younger children were at the ages where a few dollars worth of brightly colored plastic went a long way, and they were still about as likely to play with the boxes as with the toys. It did not take much to make them happy, which was a good thing, because “not much” was exactly what was heading their way.

But our eldest child, Natalie, wanted a computer, and not just any computer. Unfortunately, for us, she had set her sights high. She wanted a better computer than NASA had owned when they put two men on the moon! She wanted a computer that would draw and design — one that would navigate the Internet and compose music. She wanted a computer that would write, print, edit, walk, talk, and shave. She wanted the super-duper deluxe model that could do just about anything except pay for itself.

“What are we going to do?” I asked Marsha late one night. It was about a week before Christmas, and I was all out of ideas. I jokingly added that since I didn't own a gun or a ski mask, robbing a store was out of the question. I had all but pulled up the floorboards in the old part of the house in search of Confederate gold. It was just no use. My pockets remained empty.

Marsha looked at me with luminous eyes and a confident tone. “We're going to get her what we can afford, tell her that we love her, and wish her a Merry Christmas,” she explained. “And that will be that!” She paused and touched my shoulder gently. “She knows you've been sick and that things have been tough around here. She will just have to understand.”

Did I mention that the woman I married is a genius? The thought of telling the truth never entered my mind.

That afternoon, we sat down with our nine-year-old daughter and explained the financial facts of life. We told her we loved her and that a computer was definitely in her future at some point, but for now, we just couldn't manage it. Then we asked her if there was something else she might like, something a little closer to the reality of our budget. By way of a reply, she asked if she could think about it for a while. We told her that would be fine. Then, as if we hadn't just destroyed her hopes of a good Christmas, which we most definitely had, she got up from her chair and went off to do her homework.

“Well, that wasn't so bad,” my wife noted.

“I'll be laying on the railroad tracks if you need me,” I replied, totally exhausted from the whole ordeal.

The rest of the day passed without incident, but by bedtime, Natalie still had not gotten back to us about her replacement gift and I began to get nervous.

“Don't worry about it,” Marsha said before we went to sleep that night. “She's just disappointed. If she doesn't tell us something in a day or two, we'll ask her again.”

The following day, I found the note.

The kids were at school, Marsha was at work, and I was straightening the house when I noticed a slip of paper sticking out of Natalie's Christmas stocking. I took the note to the kitchen table, smoothed it out, and read the following words:

Dear Santa and Jesus,

My dad has been sick and he can't buy me a computer. But that's ok. Can you bring me a puppy instead? If you bring me a puppy, then my Mom and Dad won't have to spend any money. And can you please make my Dad better, too?

Merry Christmas and I love you.

That evening I showed the note to my wife. We looked at each other, unable to speak. Finally, she broke the silence.

“Santa
and
Jesus,” she said, shaking her head. “Talk about hauling out the big guns.”

I nodded, proud of my young daughter. She was giving up a lot to make sure things worked out for her parents.

“If you get the dog,” I said sheepishly, “I'll take care of getting better.” Marsha nodded and squeezed my hand. We both knew noncompliance with this particular note was not an option. A canine would be joining our family.

It turned out to be a wonderful Christmas for all of us. The little ones got a few trucks and dolls, socks and underwear, and enjoyed playing with the boxes and wrappings a great deal. Our eldest — much wiser than her nine years let on — got Baby, a cocker spaniel whose first home had been a Dumpster. Marsha got a bottle of rank perfume and an armload of child-made treasures. And I got two presents: I got my health back, for which I thank both Santa and Jesus, and I got a reminder that the best gifts are the ones that money can't buy.

BY VIVIENNE MACKIE

“S
hh!” Denise whispered. “Mom will come!”

But as our blanket tent collapsed on top of the three of us, even Denise dissolved into another bout of giggling.

I was the only one who noticed the bedroom door open, as Mom peered in, then closed it again quietly. She knew what was going on, but realized it was a special time for us three girls, a special time that was repeated each year at Christmas.

Many people don't have good or treasured memories of Christmas and the holiday season, so I feel very lucky. I know from experience that good memories are not linked to money or how many presents you get for Christmas. Rather, good memories come from having family and special friends close by, and from creating a tradition or ritual that binds people together and makes them feel part of a select group.

Our tradition revolved around Turkish Delight.

Even though our family had little money to spare when I was growing up in Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe), we always loved Christmas. Christmas was when my Gran and Grandad drove their little car — loaded down with mysterious packets and a basket of yummy goodies — all the way from Umtali, a town about sixty miles away, to stay with us.

They slept in my small bedroom, which I didn't have to share, like my sisters did. So, while they visited, I slept with two of my four sisters, Denise and Veronita, who were just younger than me. We slept head to toe, with my pillow at the end of the bed, and strangely, we did sleep — a bit.

It was a time of intense anticipation and excitement, a buildup to the big day, so late at night we'd still be whispering together. And, quite by accident, a special sister ritual developed between us that included Turkish Delight.

Only at Christmas did Mom and Dad buy the sweet candy called Turkish Delight. Because it was so scarce, it became a symbol of the season to us. A week before Gran and Gran-dad arrived, we all went to Mrs. Simpson's general shop in the village, hoping and praying that the Turkish Delight had already arrived. It had! We were lucky that Mrs. Simpson put in a special order to a big shop in the capital of Salisbury, because many people in our small town wanted the delicacy, too! We gazed at the big open box on the counter with layers of Turkish Delight nestled on soft pink-and-white tissue paper and our mouths watered. Pink-and-white paper for the pink-and-white sweet seemed totally appropriate to us. One year, there had been green tissue too, which we later discovered was for the pistachio-flavored Delight. Powdered sugar coated each of the pieces, which were cut into neat blocks about one inch square.

The number of pieces we purchased depended on how much money Mom and Dad had saved throughout the year, and that number was always divisible by nine. That way Gran, Grandad, Mom, Dad, me, and all four of my sisters would have the same number of pieces.

“I think we saved three pounds this year,” Mom said to Dad. “Hmm, then we can buy about seventy-five pieces?”

“Vee,” Dad called, “come and do the sum. We need a number divided by nine so everyone gets the same.”

At nine years old, I was able to decipher the figure quickly. “I think seventy-two is the closest,” I said, my fingers and mind calculating as fast as I could. “So … we all get … um … eight pieces!”

Mrs. Simpson allowed us girls to help put our family's Delight into a box, and we gleefully licked our fingers. Oh, how sweet! How special!

“Remember girls,” Mom said once we got home. “You have eight pieces each.” She looked at us, one at a time. “You can eat them whenever you want, but when they're gone — that's it.” We all nodded. We never questioned this, as it was completely fair. No one got more than anyone else, but we each could choose when to eat our share.

Veronita, Denise, and I always ate ours at night, in the bed, under the blanket. In lucky years, we had enough pieces to last about three or four nights — eight or nine pieces each, two or three each night. This was a lucky year! We each carefully picked out one white, one pink, and maybe one green, put them on a plate, and set the plate in the place of honor: the chest of drawers next to the bed, where we could peek at it frequently before bedtime.
No problem getting us to bed on those nights!

I watched the door click shut and smiled. My sisters didn't even realize Mom had looked in. It was doubly dark: The lights were off, and we were in our blanket tent with its special, mysterious feel. We whispered, we giggled, and we savored the sweet slowly — to make the special pleasure stretch halfway through the night — licking our fingers carefully after each piece of Delight.

While we were in our own little world, enjoying Turkish Delight and each other's company, we told one another what we had bought or made for the others in the family, and wondered aloud what we'd get in return. That night, I sensed somehow that what we were experiencing was a special gift in itself.

Today, when I see boxes of Turkish Delight in specialty shops, my mouth waters and a flutter of anticipation begins. I hear girlish giggles and warm memories flood over me. I am transported back in time to that special place beneath the blanket tent, where whispered secrets and wishes were sacred. I remember the feel of biting into the soft stickiness, reveling in the fact that the Delight would stick to my teeth and perhaps last longer. And, as the sensation of eating something so delightfully special that it entered our home only once a year enveloped me, I realized that, perhaps even more special than the Turkish Delight, was the perfect enjoyment of eating it with my sisters, companionably, in the dark.

Knowing that because we had Turkish Delight in our possession meant our family was wealthy, in all ways that counted, is a good memory — a time of delight — that will bless me forever.

BY AMY AMMONS MULLIS

T
he old two-storied house I grew up in was a multigabled thing with a long porch of uneven boards that covered the entire front, boasting a grand picture window that simply begged for a Christmas tree. Because the house was heated only by fireplaces and cooled by breezes through open windows, Christmas was the only time of year that the living room saw any activity. The rest of the time, it stayed closed and quiet, the stillness and silence waiting for December, when the pop and crackle of burning firewood sounded in the grate. From the inside, the big picture window reflected the firelight like a pictured echo, and from the outside it framed the enchanted glow of our Christmas tree so beautifully it brought tears to my eyes.

Over the years, vivid memories — bits and pieces of storybook Christmases — can still be pulled from my mind as easily as decorations were pulled out of the great wooden trunk in the closet beneath the stairs. I recall with pleasure the simple act of watching Mama put the finishing touches on arrangements of plastic poinsettias and shiny silver balls on the mantelpiece, and tromping through the snow in the front yard to see how the tree looked from outside. After all the decorations were in place, Mom swept the old green carpet to make the tired nap stand up like a rug of soft grass. But my favorite memory is a musical one that rings merrily in my ear from time to time.

In our house, you could expect to hear almost any kind of music. Mama played Gilbert and Sullivan operettas and Beethoven's symphonies on the hi-fi, Daddy played the world's greatest polka tunes and the complete set of Hank Williams's greatest hits from Reader's Digest, and, as time went by, my eldest sister kept us up to date with the latest hits from the Beatles. Best of all, though, were the times Dad would pick up the old guitar that was always within reach beside his favorite chair and strum some tunes from days gone by while he hummed along.

“Sing it. Sing the words!” I'd beg as I swung on the arm of his chair, convinced he made the lyrics up on the spot.

Often, just to tease me, he'd sing a line or two of some silly song he'd picked up in his travels when he'd served on a destroyer in the North Atlantic, and on a submarine in the Pacific in World War II, his eyes twinkling as he waited for the question he knew I would ask.

“Is that a real song?” I'd ask, my brow wrinkled in concentration. “Are you making that up?”

My all-time favorite was “Wabash Cannonball.” If I was quiet and pretended I wasn't listening, he'd sing a verse or two and end up with that lively chorus made famous by Roy Acuff years before.

One Christmas, when I was five or perhaps six, the family gathered around the fireplace, holiday cheer wrapped around us like a cozy comforter. We cracked almonds and walnuts from the fruit basket and rescued roasting oranges from the toes of stockings hanging dangerously low on the mantle. Absentmindedly, Daddy pulled out his guitar and leaned back in his chair contentedly, his legs stretched toward the warmth of the fireplace, and began to strum. When he started to sing, I tore my thoughts from Christmas gifts and goodies and scooted toward him, dragging the newest addition to my baby doll family along with me.

I don't have a library of childhood memories that I can call up on demand. As times change and seasons fade, details recoil on shadowy tendrils of half-forgotten thought, but I remember the warmth of the fire on my face that Christmas, and the music that filled the room as Daddy played my favorite ditty on his old guitar. I can see him lounging comfortably, head back and eyes closed, singing the chorus to “Wabash Cannonball” in a clear voice. I remember thinking that I'd better listen with all my might because I never knew when Daddy might sing it all the way through again. And as the last notes trailed into a blend of crackling firewood mixed with the laughter of my brother and sisters, I knew that “Wabash Cannonball” would always be my favorite Christmas carol.