Sharing Christmas Page 4

  “Nothing?” Mama asked.

  “Nothing,” Rula Mae repeated.

  The rest of us stared in disbelief. Was this really our eight-year-old Rula Mae, who begged constantly for frilly dresses and white knee-high boots and a red coat with a little white fake-fur collar, to say nothing of a red patent-leather purse with a tiny red-backed mirror inside?

  She made the announcement just two weeks before Christmas at our Family Fiesta, which is what Mama called our family home evenings. Mama said they should sound fun. My sister Laverne called them Family Festers, which she said was closer to the truth. Mama said Laverne's problem was being thirteen but that she'd be nice again in a few years.

  “No gifts?” Darwin asked after a moment of stunned silence. “None at all?”

  Darwin was going on ten and had been campaigning for months for a bicycle of his own, black and silver, with a light. He'd probably have to be satisfied with our broken-down old family bike, since with a big family like ours we didn't always get what we hoped for.

  “I don't want to get anything. I'm just going to give.” Rula Mae smiled serenely. “It's more blessed to give than to receive.”

  You'd think a halo should sprout above her head, the way she said it.

  “She learned that in Primary,” Darwin snorted. “They're always telling us that.” Clearly he hadn't been taken in by the propaganda. Tootie and Max, who were seven and four, stared without saying a thing. Laverne watched through slitted eyes as if she were trying to figure out what Rula Mae was up to. “What is it you're going to give, Rula Mae?” she asked.

  “Me,” Rula Mae flung out her arms. “I'm going to give me!”

  Dad and Mama exchanged a glance.

  Clearing his throat, Dad asked, “And who is going to be the lucky recipient of this gift of you, Rula Mae?”

  “I'm going to give me to Sister Wanda and Sister Belle and Sister Ora Lou,” Rula Mae said. “They don't have any children. They must be very lonely.” Her voice was buttery and smooth.

  “For crying out loud.” Laverne said. “You're eight years old, Rula Mae. If Sister Wanda and Sister Belle and Sister Ora Lou wanted a child, they'd get one that was still little and cute.”

  Rula Mae continued to smile.

  Sister Wanda and Sister Belle and Sister Ora Lou lived in the tall red brick house out on Angel's Roost where they'd been born. None of them had ever married. Mama and Dad called them the Swenson sisters, but we kids called them the Three Scrooges because their big old house was crammed full of things they'd had when they were children, things we would love to have. But the sisters never shared any of it.

  We'd never been inside their house, but we'd all had the sisters as Sunday School teachers at one time or another. They told thrilling stories about the Old Days and about the dolls and dollhouses, the bicycles and wagons, the music boxes and books and games and dress-up clothes they had had when they were young. The things were all still there, in the attic of the old house on Angel's Roost, wasting away. Every kid in town knew that.

  And every kid in town had plotted at one time or another how we might get in to play with all those things the Three Scrooges told us about.

  Dad cleared his throat again. “It's a very nice thought, Rula Mae, but what about us? You can't just leave your family behind and go live with somebody else.”

  “Let her go,” Darwin said. “Then we'll all have more room.”

  Still Rula Mae smiled.

  A look passed between Mama and Dad, one of those looks that said whole encyclopedias in a language we kids didn't understand. During the duration of that look, they came to some kind of understanding.

  “All right,” Dad said. “All in favor of letting Rula Mae go live with Sister Wanda and Sister Belle and Sister Ora Lou, please signify by raising the right hand.”

  That's the way it was in our family. We voted on all the big things, like whether we were going to have ice cream or chocolate cake on special occasions (you couldn't vote for both) and whether we would clean our rooms before or after lunch on Saturdays (you couldn't vote for neither).

  All of us kids raised our hands.

  Dad nodded. “Ma -jority rules. Your mother and I will speak with the Swenson sisters, Rula Mae. But did you ever consider that they might say no?”

  “They won't,” Rula Mae said. “They need a little girl to share their things.”

  And suddenly Laverne and Darwin and I knew why Rula Mae was giving herself to Sister Wanda and Sister Belle and Sister Ora Lou. Rula Mae had figured out how to get all those things in the Three Scrooges' attic.

  Couldn't Mama and Dad see that was what she was up to? I was about to blat it out, but Laverne saw me open my mouth. She put a finger to her lips.

  It didn't take me long to think it through. If Rula Mae was there at the Three Scrooges' house, then we could get in, too. Even Laverne wanted to see that fabled attic.

  None of us knew exactly what the Swenson sisters said about Rula Mae coming to be their little girl, but Mama and Dad reported that we were all invited over to their house on Christmas Eve.

  Oh, brilliant Rula Mae, to think of a way for us all to share in the glories of that treasure-filled attic on Christmas Eve! Surely the sisters would invite us to go up there to play while the grown-ups talked. Maybe they'd even let each of

  us choose a gift to take home.

  Rula Mae didn't pack a thing except her toothbrush to take with her on Christmas Eve. Why should she? The Swenson sisters had everything she would need.

  It was snowing that night as we drove up Angel's Roost and parked our car. When Sister Belle and Sister Ora Lou opened their door, we saw they'd built a cheerful fire in the big fireplace to help warm up their parlor, which is what they called their living room.

  “Come in,” Sister Belle boomed, helping us remove our coats and brush off the snow. “Wanda asked us to excuse her since she's ...”

  “ ... in the kitchen,” said Sister Ora Lou. “She's the ...”

  “ ... cook in the family,” finished Sister Belle.

  Sister Belle was a big woman and her Christmas dress, which she'd worn to ward parties for as long as I could remember, looked like a red velvet tent. She hugged each one of us as we trooped in.

  Sister Ora Lou, small and birdlike in her familiar green dress, put an arm around Rula Mae's shoulders. “Well, so this is our new little girl. We're ...”

  “ ... right happy to have you, sweetheart,” Sister Belle finished.

  Rula Mae preened.

  Odd odors came from the kitchen. “Oysters,” Sister Belle said when she saw Darwin wrinkling his nose.

  “Oysters?” Rula Mae said. “We always have hot dogs and popcorn on Christmas Eve.”

  Sister Belle's laugh was as deep and musical as the grandfather clock that bonged seven times in the parlor, and Sister Ora Lou's was like the bleating of a small goat.

  “Hot dogs!” Sister Belle exclaimed. “Papa always said Christmas Eve suppers ...”

  “ ... should be elegant,” Sister Ora Lou said. “Remember the year Mama forgot the ...”

  “Oh, mercy yes,” Sister Belle interrupted, “and Wanda and I rode the toboggan down the hill ...”

  “ ... to borrow some,” Sister Ora Lou said, and the two of them bonged and bleated again.

  The toboggan! I'd forgotten there was a toboggan, too, among the treasures of the attic.

  Sister Belle put an arm around Rula Mae's shoulders. “Well, dear, you might as well get acquainted with your new home. What would you like to see first?”

  “The attic,” Rula Mae said without hesitation.

  Laverne and Darwin and I stared at her in admiration. None of us would have dared to come right out and ask like that.

  “All right,” said Sister Belle. “Wanda,” she boomed toward the kitchen, “we're going up to the attic. Call us when the oysters and turnips are finished.”

  “Turnips?” Rula Mae asked. “Family tradition,” Sister Belle said. “And kidney pie, with suet pudding for dessert. Come along now.”

  Rula Mae looked a little greenish as we all followed Sister Belle and Sister Ora Lou up the stairs, along a hallway, through a door, and up another flight of stairs. Dad carried Max and Mama held Tootie by the hand.

  “Mercy,” Sister Belle puffed. “We haven't been up here since ...”

  Sister Ora Lou spoke up. “And that was to bring down the ...”

  “And then it didn't even work anymore.” Sister Belle shook her head sadly.

  That should have given us a clue, that whatever-it-was that didn't work anymore. But now that we were actually there in the fabled attic, Rula Mae, Laverne, Darwin, and I held our breaths in anticipation.

  We looked around. Where were the shining toys and games and wagons and other things we'd heard stories about for so many years?

  Oh, the things were there, all right, just as the sisters had said. But they were rusty, dusty, broken, faded, crumbled. The toboggan had a hole in its bottom. One of the bicycles was missing its handlebars; the tires on all three had disintegrated. The dollhouse was warped and discolored, probably from rain seeping through the attic roof.

  In the dimness of the attic Rula Mae stood staring. Slowly she walked around, taking inventory of the things we'd heard so much about. She touched the rusty runner on a sled. She bent down to look at a moth-eaten doll.

  She looked at the things for a long time. Then she walked over and smiled at Sister Belle and Sister Ora Lou.

  “Can we go down and sit by the fire?” she said. “Will you tell us all the stories again?”

  As we walked back down the stairs I'm sure we were all thinking the same thing: that it was only in the memories of the three sisters that the fabulous treasures of the attic were still bright and shining. And they had already shared them over and over again with us, all those wonderful stories of three little girls of another time. Scrooges? No, not at all.

  They told the stories again by the fire, and when Sister Wanda in her bright blue dress (they looked like Christmas ornaments, the three sisters in red, green, and blue) served us the oyster supper (with hot dogs on the side for some of us), they shared even more stories.

  I don't think the sisters were too surprised when Rula Mae asked if they minded if she didn't come live with them after all. They said they would love to have her but realized that her family wouldn't be complete without her.

  Mama invited Sister Wanda and Sister Belle and Sister Ora Lou to come to our house the next day to share our traditional Christmas dinner: roast chicken with mashed potatoes, canned corn, green Jell-O, and chocolate cake with homemade ice cream. Then we all hugged each of the sister, silently thanking them for the unnamed gift they'd given us, and went out through the snow to our car to count through our own memories.

  Darwin started. “Remember the Family ...” “ ... Festers?” Laverne finished. “And the way we always ...”

  “ ... voted on everything,” I said.

  Mama joined in. “Remember the Christmas when Rula Mae ...”

  “ ... gave myself away,” Rula Mae giggled. “And how glad we are,” Mama prompted, “that ...”

  “ ... she changed her mind,” we chorused. Our little house didn't have an attic, but we had our own store of shining treasures.

  THE GIFT OF ONE

  Emily Watts

  Of all the million, million stars

  That ever lit the night,

  Was ever there a star that shone

  With such a radiant light?

  One star among the millions,

  One star to show the way,

  One star to light the path to where

  The baby Jesus lay.

  Of all the lovely children born

  To lives of woe or bliss,

  Was ever there a child of such

  A countenance as His?

  One child among the millions,

  One child sent from above,

  One child to light the world with His

  Inestimable love.

  Of all the million, million griefs

  That men and women bear,

  Was ever there a sorrow like

  The one He suffered there

  One twilight in the garden

  Known as Gethsemane,

  When blood and tears became the price

  Of perfect charity?

  In all the vast, unmeasured span

  Of all eternity,

  Was ever there a night when such

  A glory came to be?

  One star to conquer darkness,

  One Prince of Peace and Right,

  One life the gift to draw us back

  Into eternal light.

  CHRISTMAS ALONE

  Marilyn Arnold

  In a sense Christmas has not been one holiday for me, but many holidays. As I have changed, and my circumstances have changed, the season has altered considerably, although its signs and symbols have remained quite constant. Ever since I can remember, there has been the rather odd but happy combination of festivity and worship. There have been children on Santa's knee and children solemn in over-sized bathrobes next to a doll in a makeshift manger. There have always been red and green baubles and streamers, bells, holly, candy canes, stockings, and the second chapter of Luke recited to the strains of “Silent night, holy night.” There have always been gifts extraordinary in their bright wrappings under a lighted tree, reduced to the ordinary when stripped of their mystery.

  When I was a child, nearly everything associated with Christmas became a precious ritual, from the placing of the same ornament (the only decoration my parents could afford in the jobless days of their first Christmas together) at the top of the tree to the waffle supper that followed the hanging of the stockings on Christmas Eve. Then, there was the piling into the thick quilted bed-covers with whistles, horns, and other clanging things to await the six o'clock yell from my brothers: “Merry Christmas! Turn up the stoker!”

  The house rule strictly forbade children to arise until the furnace, fed by a stoker my father filled with coal every morning and evening, had warmed the house. We gathered in eager anticipation before the closed door that separated kitchen from living room—I having spent the night with hands clamped over my ears, praying for sleep that would make morning come more quickly. At some unspoken signal, Father opened the door and we burst into a room transformed. I raced to the big chair where my gifts were invariably placed.

  There was not much money in those days, and our gifts were modest by any standards, but to us they were a dream come true. One year a neighbor made a wooden sled with “Neddie” painted on it for my younger brother. Another year my old tricycle sat shining in a new coat of orange paint for him, and a new red scooter greeted me. Still another year there was a very adult pocket watch and chain for one of the boys. Every year, in the seat of honor, there was a new teddy bear for me, to replace what was left of last year's one-eyed, ragged-eared lump of matted fur. And always, there was at least one book apiece from our favorite series: for the boys, Little Woodsman of the North or Little Philip of Wales; for me, Little Ann of Canada or Little Greta of Denmark. Later there were books like A Girl of the Limberlost, a title that still sounds mysterious and wonderful— “Limberlost.”

  In my teen years, I was the spirit of Christmas personified—loving the season with a joyous passion that I now view with nothing short of amazement. I started playing Christmas carols in November, and didn't let up until January. I wrapped gifts weeks in advance and delighted in seeing them spill out from under the tree. I loved decorating cookies and visiting relatives, especially Myrene, who made wonderful home-dipped chocolates. There was an unspoken agreement among my brothers and me that we spent Christmas Eve at home—no dates, no parties, just family singing and reading together and keeping alive the beloved rituals of our childhood.

  And then one day the shine was gone. Reluctant to admit it, even to myself, I kept up the act for years, sometimes driving many long miles through terrifying storms in order to be “home for Christmas.” As I grew older, the season seemed to bring less peace and joy than a heightened sense of pain and loss. Surrounded by celebration, the person without spouse or children perhaps becomes more acutely aware than at other times of a cavern somewhere deep inside.

  Connections that ordinarily are strong and satisfying seem perilously thin and tentative. The feeling of aloneness grows more acute, even if one is not actually alone. Sensitized by the season, I became aware of a universal sorrow at Christmastime among others—those grieving for lost loved ones, those hungering for lost opportunities, those suffering from illness and pain, those yearning for a home.

  This undercurrent of sorrow began to define Christmas for me, though I had some bright moments as I plowed dutifully through the seasonal observances. I began dreading the approach of the season, then struggling through it and feeling immense relief at the arrival of December 26. What a change this was from my childhood, when I physically hurt each Christmas night to hear my father launch into his annual rendition of “Dinner is done, night has come, worn and tired are they. Gun won't shoot, horn won't toot, blocks all lost but ten. But never fear, just wait one year, old Chris will come again... .” As he sang, I ached with the realization that it was over; and it was no consolation that in just one year, Christmas would return with all its splendor and gladness. I remember silently begging him not to sing that song because it was the world's saddest song to me. But he always sang it. To go from dreading the day's passing to earnestly wishing it past was indeed a change.

  Each succeeding year seemed more difficult than the last, and family gatherings, much as I love my brothers and their wives and children, more painful. They seemed so secure in their own separate family circles that the more they tried to draw me in, the more I felt excluded. I found myself wanting simply to slip away to some unknown place, the desert perhaps, at Christmastime. But that was never possible, because my parents and the others were counting on me.

  Then about four years ago, and for the first time in my life, I found myself with no obligations at Christmastime. My parents flew to Australia to spend Christmas with one brother's family; my brother in Utah was involved with his children and their families, and they, thankfully, did not insist that I join them; and the women with whom I share a home had gone to visit family out of state. Instead of escaping, I stayed in my mountain home, isolated, adrift with snow, the nearest neighbor some distance away. I will never forget that Christmas Eve as I did battle with my soul, coming to terms at last with the prospect of hating Christmas for the rest of my life, or casting aside self-pity to join with others of God's children in glad celebration of the Savior's birth.