I had an entirely different issue written for today, but I woke up yesterday morning and began talking to the kids about some of my best (and worst) Christmas memories. This discussion happened, in part, because my 13-year-old is so obsessed with getting this gaming VR headset and he’s so afraid that he’s not going to find it under the tree that he never stops talking about it. Yesterday he made a paper model of the VR headset to show me exactly what it looks like and how it works. As if I hadn’t watched like 100 videos with him already.
It made me think back to when I was sixteen, which might have been the most dramatic diva moment of my Christmas past. I can’t even remember what I wanted that Christmas, but I woke up to find that Santa left me a sewing machine under the tree. My mom had enjoyed making clothes when she was a teenager and she thought that I might, too. “I took a chance on you this year,” she said.
At first, I tried to seem grateful, or maybe I threw a fit, I can’t remember. All I know is that my eyes grew wet. It must be a big misunderstanding. A sewing machine? Didn’t my parents know me at all?
“We can go buy patterns at the fabric store,” my mom said, sensing my despair and talking faster while glancing sideways at my dad. “You can make anything you want. It will be fun.”
I’m sure I made a face and ran to my bedroom. Luckily, my little sister, Chelsea, was only ten and kept up the magic of Christmas. I think I probably sulked the rest of Christmas day, acting like a complete spoiled brat. Which is how my son will probably act if he doesn’t get his VR headset on Christmas morning.
“I just want you to live in the present moment,” I told him the other day at breakfast.
He stuffed his Nutella pancake into his mouth. “Mom, when I wear the headset, I can still see everything in the room: the couch, the bookshelves, the books. I just see little marshmallow guys running around too, and I can laser them.”
Lovely.
Another funny thing happened to me on Christmas once. I might have been about 13-years-old. All I wanted that year—it would have been 1988—was a television in my bedroom. Remember those small gray TV’s with the silver rabbit ears antennae? It was a fight though because my parents didn’t believe any child should get a television in the bedroom. I think they were afraid I may never leave my room again (similar to my feelings about my son’s desire for a VR headset), and they insisted that they would not get it for me.
A week before Christmas I woke up in the middle of the night after having a dream. In the dream, I went down to the basement, walked to the far corner of the room and found an unfamiliar boxy silhouette with a blanket over it. I lifted the blanket up and found a small Zenith television box.
In the morning, I woke up and remembered the dream. After I dressed and got ready for school, I snuck down into the basement. I walked to the part of the basement where I found the TV in the dream and saw the exact same silhouette with a floral quilt tossed on top. When I lifted the quilt, I found the TV. Isn’t that so weird? I GOT THE TV IN MY BEDROOM! But the subconscious is so powerful, isn’t it? It literally discovered my TV.
Needless to say, it was a wonderful life that Christmas, even if I had to feign surprise when I opened my presents.
But *my best Christmas of all* was when I was even younger, maybe around five or six. It was 1980. I woke up in the wee hours of morning or maybe after midnight, since that’s when we used to open our gifts, and I found a Strawberry Shortcake bike under the tree. It had a small little horn you could squeeze to make it sound like a clown’s nose and these adorable little red and white pom-poms hanging off the handlebars.
That bike might as well have been the Hope Diamond I loved it so much.
When I imagine how I want my kids to feel on Christmas, it’s a slice of that magic I felt when I saw that Strawberry Shortcake bike when I was five. The bike had been put together and it was gleaming and there were lights were twinkling against the silver handlebars. I rode it around the living room, wobbling on the training wheels and not caring about another single thing I got under the tree that year.
“You know what my favorite part of Christmas is?” my 13-year-old recently said to me. “It’s not opening the presents. It’s the moment when you come downstairs and first see all of the presents under the tree. When it’s quiet, and it’s just so magical to see it all there together.”
“It’s beautiful,” I told him. Because he’s right. There’s so much joy in that moment of stillness right before the wrapping paper flies through the air and the thank you’s begin and the hugs and the chocolate croissants. For a moment, it’s just you and Santa and the Christmas tree, and it’s absolute magic.
Now let’s just hope my son finds what he’s hoping for under the tree.
I hope all of you feel some of this same unadulterated joy this Christmas. Thank you so much for reading, and please share in the comments below. I’d love to hear about your best (or WORST) Christmas present you received growing up.
The best gift? Has to be an American Girl doll when I was about seven. I desperately wanted one because it was the height of the American Girl doll craze, and I'd read all of the books. I was delighted when I opened up my Christmas presents that morning and there was Molly with her perfect pigtail braids. Love at first sight.