If you were to ask me, “What’s the best Christmas gift you ever received?” the first answer to pop into my head would undoubtedly be my red tutu. That’s me in the picture, in sequin heaven and matching Keds, Christmas 1968. A gift from my mother, as if she could already tell I was never going to be a ballerina and wanted to offer a sparkly apology in advance. I’m not sure I’ve ever felt more special.
Throughout my youth, she often gave me one gift that made me feel that way. It would be something she picked up on a trip to New York or San Francisco, a trinket from Saks or better yet, from an antique store…something that appealed to her small offbeat streak and that she felt might feed my larger one too. One year it was a pin that said “Nixon,” written in rhinestones. I have no idea why she bought it, or why I loved it, but it went with me every time I went dancing for years afterward. Once it was a strange green basket on a waxed linen cord to wear around my neck, and I did. Of course it drew some real sideways glances at school, but that’s part of what I liked about it.
These treats were something only she and I understood, my membership card for a very elite club. While I’d open it, my mom would begin the explanation of where she found whatever it was, and why it reminded her of me. My siblings didn’t get anything like those strange gifts, which made me like them even more.
So I would spend the days before Christmas eagerly scanning the presents under our tree with an eye for the small box that might be my one special gift. The love note from my mom, just to me.
If you were to ask what my favorite gift I ever gave was, I’d have a harder time answering. There have been many gifts over the years that I’ve been excited to give for different reasons, but all of them probably had something in common — they carried a portion of my own heart with them. They, too, were love note gifts.
One of my favorite holiday songs has these lines in it:
“The whole world waiting, was getting all upset,
Thinking, talking, screaming
about those gifts they didn’t get.
Now I’m not one to tell somebody how to live,
But what about those gifts
that are uniquely yours to give?”
It seems that the older I get, the less I care about what comes in the packages I receive. I’m much more interested in love notes than in things, the words and actions that connect me to the people I love, introduce me to the goodness in the world around me, and remind me of what I am meant to be.
One of my most beloved Christmas gifts of recent memory came two years ago, while my husband was living in Panama. He would not arrive home until December 23, and none of our children lived in AZ, so I was spending the month of December alone. Such a dramatic change from the busy, tradition-laden family Christmases we’d enjoyed over the years. I was feeling very sorry for myself. One lonely night, there was a tap at my door. I was in my pajamas, so opened it just a crack.
There was my home teacher, a man I’d never found a single thing in common with nor even much reason to like, standing outside my gate. He didn’t say a word. He just raised his banged-up trumpet from junior high in the moonlight and began quietly fumbling his way through Away in a Manger.
He stood and played, I stood and cried. His unique gift transcended its humble packaging, becoming a love note meant just for me. He’ll never even know what he gave, but I will never forget.
It’s a memory that prompts me to ask the question, what about those gifts that are uniquely mine to give?
December shows us that even the most unlikely neighbor has a string of lights not only in his attic, but also in his heart. As the shadows are chased from the lit faces of our homes, it’s as if we are suddenly willing to release the love notes we usually guard so jealously. Each Christmas I am amazed at what lies within people but is rarely seen or suspected. I’m glad it gets dark enough, once a year, to turn the lights on inside us, allowing a glimpse of what the world can be, and therefore should.