My memories of Christmas as a child mostly consisted of a very old, white, aluminum Christmas tree that my half-sister was going to throw away. My siblings and I would make homemade decorations to hang on it. I especially remember the paper chains, where we would cut paper strips, color them red and green, and glue them together with homemade paste made of flour and water. One year we had a tumble weed that we decorated when the aluminum tree finally fell apart. On Christmas morning we would wake up to a sock with candy, fruit, and nuts. No presents.
But there is one Christmas that really stands out in my memory. It had been a particularly bad year for my family. We had moved to Spur, because Daddy found a job there. I was in the second grade. It was a very cold winter, and we had to walk to school. It seems you had to live at least 2 miles from the school to be able to ride the bus. It was so cold that we couldn’t feel our fingers when we got to school, and the teacher had to pry my lunch sack out of my hands. I think my older sister had it even worse, as she had to stay in the nurse’s office for quite a while trying to warm up. After that, we were told we could ride the bus.
Then Christmas break came. Daddy had lost his job, and they had turned the electricity off to our house. Mama and all the kids (5 at the time, including a baby) huddled on the bed with all the blankets we had. You could still see everyone’s breath and ice on the inside of the windows and in the cracks in the walls. We were down to only pinto beans and rice to eat. It was a really bad time to not be in school.
One morning Daddy came in and told us to get in the car. We drove to a mercantile store downtown. Daddy said we were all going in. This was very unusual because Daddy never let us go into stores. A man unlocked the door for us and told us we could each pick out anything in the store that we wanted, and it would be our Christmas gift from him. He gave Mama a basket and told her to fill it with everything she needed to cook Christmas lunch, even dessert. We were all so shocked, we didn’t realize that it was Christmas Day. It seemed so magical. My sister picked out a Thumbelina doll and begged me to get a stroller to go with it. It seemed like we looked around for hours. I chose a red rubber ball and it lasted for years, until there was no red coating left on it and there were chunks out of the rubber from being hit with our makeshift bats made of two by fours. When we got home, the electricity had been turned back on, and the house was so cozy and warm. One of the best things that day was a big Christmas lunch, with no beans or rice. I think this was probably one of the best Christmases we ever had. We had no tree and no stockings, but someone cared about us, and I am still in awe of how God sent this angel to show us His love. God came down that Christmas and joined us for a day I will never forget!
We want to thank Naomi Jones for sharing this post.
Women's Ministry 