Hi Subscriber,
Time for a story, this being the last Saturday before Christmas and all. Enjoy!
"Spoiled!"
(excerpt from Memoirs Of A Lastling).
Mama did something the year I turned seven that was completely uncharacteristic for her. She ASKED me what I wanted for Christmas.
Usually, she just bought or made something in duplicate and gave the same thing to Kathy (3 yrs older) and me.
The year before that, it was a dress with puffy sleeves. Kathy got the deep red calico and I got......green. Ugh! To a six year old who hated green and loved pink it was like a death sentence, seeing how I was expected to actually wear it AND be grateful at the same time.
I was conflicted over it though, seething with jealousy one moment and ashamed of myself the next for feeling so.
But now was my moment. This chance might never repeat itself. So I took a deep breath and rattled off a well-rehearsed list of Christmas morning wishes.
"A table and chair set, teacups with saucers, dishes and silverware, a doll big as me that can walk when I hold her hand, and....."
"Whoa there," Mama said, stifling the chuckle that rose in her throat. "There's no money tree in the backyard, but maybe we can get....some of that."
My heart sank.
But not because I wasn't going to get everything I'd listed. I really didn't expect that. It was because at this tender age, I already knew how hard Daddy worked just to keep us all fed and clothed.
The hot flush of regret made its way up my neck and across my cheeks....regret that I'd spoken so recklessly. What right had I to ask so much. I nodded my head to Mama without looking up and climbed the creaky wood-slab steps up to our attic bedroom.
I got through the next two weeks, determined to be grateful for whatever landed under the tree that year. Yet secretly I hoped that if it had to be just one thing, it would be that doll.
In the meantime, I watched my mother bake pies and my sister, Phyllis, make clothes for a friend's new baby. I could sit for just eons watching them both.
As Mama's baking filled the house with tantalizing aromas, little gingham dresses and sunsuits with tiny snaps and buttons and lace-edged Peter Pan collars magically took shape in Phyllis's deft hands.
Every now and then they would stop to admire their work and ask me what I thought whenever they caught me staring.
Quite suddenly it was Christmas Eve and boxes had appeared mysteriously under the blue spruce tree in the dining room. I examined the tags on them excitedly...at first...
My name was not on ANY of them!
My heart raced. I'd gone too far....been too greedy, and now I was getting what I deserved....nothing.
I sat glassy-eyed through dinner and went to bed quietly for once, laying on top of the nubby chenille bedspread, despite the freezing cold of our poorly insulated attic.
I awoke in the quiet hour before dawn and crept down the steps, still shuddering from cold and intending to toast my backside at the heat register.
Same boxes as last night.
As I stared into the tree lights, I noticed a flash of something blue reflected in the window.
There in the corner on the other side of the sparkling tree was a child-sized blue table and chairs. Each place at the table was set with dishes and shiny plastic silverware and a pretty little teacup and saucer.
And there in a blue chair sat a doll as tall as me with little gauzy thin white socks and shiny black shoes.
Then my glistening eyes widened in disbelief...
My longed-for curly-headed me-sized doll was wearing a yellow gingham dress with tiny buttons and a lace-edged Peter Pan collar.
Jan Dale
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