"A Christmas Memory"

Well, it's been a few weeks since I've managed to get back to this page. I'm sorry - because I've
missed it, missed talking with you. My only excuse is that the season has caused time to fly faster than usual. I'm planning to be back more regularly after Christmas.

Today I want to share with you, a story that I wrote some time ago, a true story of a little girl
at Christmas. I know it's a true story because I was that little girl.

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I remember a Christmas when I was just a little girl, about seven years old, I think. Santa was
still very important to me and I had made sure that he knew just exactly what I wanted that year. At that time a very popular line of dolls - the Ginger Doll - had caught my eye, and I had studied and
studied the entire variety, which was on display that Christmas season at one of our local dime stores.
The Ginger Doll line included a variety of choices, all with different hair colors and different outfits. The one I wanted had auburn hair and she wore a sort of Scottish tartan outfit, two piece and plaid, with a little green Tam on her head. I loved that doll and every time Mother and I went to this store, I
would wander to the particular area where the dolls were displayed, just to look at the doll and hope
she would be mine on Christmas. Although my sister, Charmaine, and I were never sure of what
we would be able to get from Santa, I was as sure as I could afford to be that this doll would be mine
on Christmas day.

Sometime in the wee hours between Christmas Eve and Christmas morning, I crept from my bed without waking Charmaine who was in the next bed sleeping. I went to the Christmas tree
in the living room. Immediately I could see the Ginger Doll under the tree, along with a doll
bed I'd also wanted. But in the moonlight streaming in through the window, my excitement flew to
despair. I could see it was not the doll I had wanted, but another - different hair color, different clothing.

I didn't wake anyone at that hour, but I remember lying down by the tree and quietly crying myself
to sleep over my disappointment. Mother found me there the next morning, sleeping, very cold and
very downhearted.

As I awoke and began telling her my sad story, I looked again at the Ginger Doll. The early
morning light allowed me to see more clearly and I was amazed to see that it was, indeed, the doll of my dreams! I was ecstatic but even at that young age, I remember feeling a bit foolish at my quickness to be disappointed.

In the years that have followed that early and memorable Christmas of mine, I have seen and
shared many times of disappointment and despair. Many times it has seemed that joy and gladness
would not follow. But just like that Christmas morning so many years ago, I have always been
surprised at my own foolishness - at my own readiness to be too soon disappointed. Human
nature, I suppose, but each time a teachable moment. I believe in my heart what I learned that
long ago Christmas. "Weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning." (Psalm 30:5)

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I don't know about you, but it seems to me that this week - just before Christmas - there's a feeling of slowing down, taking a moment and a deep breath. I hope you're able to take that moment to access and calm down, to enjoy the anticipation and hope that is Advent. The waiting for Christmas.

May your every Christmas dream come true.