When I was about 8 (yes, I forget the exact year), my father had a heart attack in the weeks before Christmas. It was serious enough to put him in the hospital and move my Aunt Claribel and Grandma to come down from North Jersey to be with him.
We lived in my mom's home which her father had built before WWI along with her 2 brothers and sister. Things were kind of grim and unsettled that year and we all went to see Dad on Christmas Eve. I remember my sister had this little winter outfit with a white fur hat and a muff she loved to wear. We marveled at the little paper cups that they used to give pills, etc., and I recall how sparse the room looked.
It was dark by the time we got home and it pretty much fit our mood. At least until we got in the house and came through the kitchen.
And I got the surprise of my life.
Uncle Bill and Uncle Alec had set up the electric trains on a platform (new), with the Christmas tree (small) on it and the trains running around it through a papier-mache tunnel (new), and a crossing gate that flashed when the train went by (also new) and a couple of new cars - a boxcar where the guy came out and unloaded little boxes and a searchlight car where the light actually worked.
Such wonders of technology I had never beheld!
I remember just running into the living room and couldn't believe it. Instant mood change for everybody.
Merry Christmas, indeed.
It was a few years before I could understand the amount of work required to do all that and the affection my uncles held for me, which only made me appreciate it more.
As you may have gathered, that wonderful memory, and the effort to make it happen, has never left me. You want the Spirit of Christmas, albeit writ small, there it is. You want to tell me there's no Santa Claus? I beg to differ.
Any time we do something good for somebody just for the Hell of it, doesn't have to be a kid, there's Saint Nick, standing behind us.
For Mama and Evi. And Troop, wherever he is.
3 comments:
Merry Christmas everybody.
Small and Large, edutcher, as a personal story and also as a shared memory that was specific yet so much more. I received it as a gift that held and conveyed the essence of Christmas! So well done I read it aloud at our small but large-in-love Mfamily Christmas Eve dinner, with appreciation there too.
We had tartufos for dessert that night, courtesy of a mention by Trooper York that tracks back several years. I'd not heard of them before he wrote of having a tartufo for dessert in NY. I looked them up then and we now have our own peppermint stick version, with fun fun putting them together as several hands to scoop ice cream, shape the balls to include the cherry in the center and then roll them in the crushed chocolate wafer crumbs are needed to make them come together.
The details of your memory also touched me, as I too found those little miniature pill cups intriguing and can recall a train set (my brother's or my uncle's?--not sure which) that had a blinking crossing, a little guy with boxes that went in and out of the car, and a light. They'd also put something in the smokestack that would smell like smoke and puff out of the stack.
Several days prior to your post, we'd also had a family recall/dicussion of the role an uncle can play. And I'd shared with the SonsM (who are now uncles themselves) how my mom's love of Christmas traced back to her dad's younger brothers who weren't married and had more income at the time bringing over the wonderous surprise of unexpected Christmas gifts during the depression and turning it what was lean verging on meager into a special day. I can picture her face as she'd tell that story, as it would get soft with a faraway look in her eyes as she went back to her memory of that.
The smoke came from pills (Lionel) or a liquid (American Flyer?) dropped down the stack.
Glad you liked it.
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