I remember Christmas as a kid as a holiday when my parents blew their lid, I know it sounds strange and it sounds so silly, but it was always the time of year when things seemed to go wrong. As other families were gathering in abundance and groups, our family was preparing for stress, tension and what came to be expected the usual screaming yelling and fighting times. Guess my parents were not the normal at all, although for me it seemed they were, it was what I learned to expect, and they never failed at giving us.
Well, this is about one Christmas I can remember when things were slightly different than normal and the holiday was really a holiday instead of a battle ground. The Holiday Season began for me that year with my seeing the lights and trees lit up in the stores and the snow falling lightly on us all. It was the first year I had money to buy my siblings and parents presents on my own. And I was determined that it would turn out to be a happy holiday.
I remember buying small presents for my siblings first and hiding them away one at a time, then came the bigger presents of course, for my parents and they were always hard to figure out as to what to get them. As the snowy season began I, searched in earnest for special gifts for each one. Knowing my time was going to run short if I didn’t hurry along I rushed through the mall searching store by store. Not finding much I really thought they would like I stopped and a light went on. I knew what dad needed, and figured out the cost and bought it anyway. I wandered into Lazy Boys showroom one winter day and saw it. A lazy Boy recliner all brown leather and shiny and new. I sat in it once that day while shopping for it. Then I ordered it to be delivered on Christmas Eve, the price was well over 200 bucks back then and I shelled it out no problem.
Then I had to figure out the hardest one to get anything for, mom. What do you get a mom who tells you, I don’t want anything, don’t bother? Well, I searched and searched through malls and stores and I looked and looked. When I was almost out of time I came upon it in a Michael’s Jewelry store. I stared through the window at the shiny ring and knew what I had to do. I rushed in and talked to the sales person, I gave him five birthdates of all of us kids. I had him assemble a silver ring with five birthstones, one for each of the birthdays of us kids. From left to right the ring carried the stones for December, January, September, June and July. It costs me over 300 bucks but I got it anyway.
Christmas Eve approached, and my parents were working, I ran down and got mom’s ring and waited for Dad’s chair to arrive. When his chair came in I had them set it in place by the fireplace, it would stay there for the next 25 years. I hid mom’s ring under the tree in the living room, just so I knew where it was and no one else and wrapped a red ribbon around Dad’s new chair before I went to bed. Amazingly for the first time in my life, that Christmas Eve was the only one I slept through till morning with no noisy fights awaking me; it just seems to be that memory for me. I slept soundly that night and it is the only Christmas Eve I think I ever did.
Christmas Morning was all white and snowy when I awoke. I looked at my bedroom window and smiled at it all. I dressed and ran down stairs and grabbed a shovel and dug the walkways clear. Then I came back in to await everyone waking up. I grabbed a bowl of cereal and waited.
By, 8; 30am everyone had awakened one by one and my siblings rushed down to see what they were getting. Dad stood by the Christmas tree and handed out the gifts and winked at me. He came over and gave me a big bear hug and said thank you for his chair. He then handed all the presents out to everyone slowly. When he finished he found the little box in back under the tree stand where I hid it and handed it to mom. I watched her take it in her hand and smile suddenly. She sat back on the couch and opened it slowly finding the dark blue velvet box inside, she looked up and smiled at dad, who looked back and shrugged his shoulders. Mom looked at him and said you shouldn’t have, Dad looked back and said I didn’t, someone else did.
Finally, after a brief pause, Dad points to me and said it’s from him. Mom paused a look of misunderstanding crossed her face and she just shook her head slightly. Then she looked down and opened the little blue velvet box. Inside bursting in silver and colors, she found her mother’s ring with five stones one for each of us. Her eyes teared up and she put it on and thanked me for the gift. The year was 1974, I remember it well indeed. I was a whole 18 years old.
The years passed and time flew by since then and it was then 1990, when I came home from the military. I came home to a situation of my dad dying of cancer with months to live and finding out before he died that mom was dying of the same too. I spent time with Dad that summer watching the Red Sox on TV, when he stopped me one day as he lay in bed, and looked me dead in the eye. He said son that Lazy Boy Recliner has always been the best present I got from any of you kids, thanks. And he never said another word about it till then, or after that moment, when he died that October his recliner was still in place by the fireplace.
One year and a day after dad died, mom was lying dying in bed at my sister’s home, and the cancer had ravaged her. As I stopped in to see her I knew she would die soon. Mom couldn’t talk anymore she had no strength left that day. But in her own way she said thank you for her ring too, as I reached out to hold her hand as she died; there on her finger was only one ring. Her wedding band was gone so was her engagement ring, but one ring remained. There shinning on her finger was the mother’s ring I gave her so many years before. She died wearing it proudly.
So, as Christmas now approaches again and the chill starts to blow in, I stop and look out my window at it all, and feel warmth deep inside. The warmth comes from knowing that for one bright, snowy Christmas morning in 1974, I reached and touched the hearts of my parents and it stayed with them till their dying days. I tell everyone today each Christmas that goes by, it is not what you receive for Christmas that counts, it’s what you give that lasts. That’s the importance of Christmas!
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