On the TENTH Day of Christmas, Saturday, December 20, 2014

I’ve just about covered all types of Christmas moments…best, favorite, funniest, but I guess I have to share my WORST gift.  I hate to share it and give the impression that I am not GRATEFUL, but I have to share the lesson I learned from it.

I wrote yesterday that my brother went to Vol State and got an apartment with some friends.  I also have to tell that he spent about 3 years at this 2 year junior college…NO, it had nothing to do with bad grades…I just think he was having FUN!  He ended up working with the Basketball team and in turn, started to work with the Nashville Sounds because the Baseball Coach was the groundskeeper.  Brian asked to be introduced to some people at the organization and so he was.  I’m not sure of all the details, but he eventually became the Clubhouse Manager of the Home side and then for the Visiting side also. Brian went on to fulfill a life-long dream of working in Major League Baseball when he became the Visiting Clubhouse Manger of the Seattle Mariners…He was given many opportunities and made many friends, but his family became his focus after a few years and he didn’t want to uproot them to move around the country.

During his years at Vol State, he rented a room with an elderly widow, Miss Emily.  She was a HOOT.  She was a woman of GREAT Faith, and treated my brother as her own.  She became a member of our family as we grew to love her and we would visit and drop by to just say HI to her when we were in the area.  We shared many meals and activities together.  We remained closed until her death.

Miss Emily sent our family individual gifts, which was NOT needed or expected.  I think I was 17, so it has been a LONG time ago.  The gift that Miss Emily gave me was a BOX of Kleenex.  I looked at the package and wondered if it was a mistake or if MAYBE some money or SOMETHING else had been placed with the box, but I could find no mistake.  I WONDERED WHY in the world, someone would give me a box of Kleenex!!  I just sat it aside and didn’t say anything to anyone.

It’s been 35 years and I can still remember the feeling I had getting that box of Kleenex.  I have never been a great tissue girl…I usually will use toilet paper to blow my nose, but Mother and Daddy used them constantly, so I know they did not go to waste. 

  

Over the years, I have come to appreciate the lessons that box taught me.  I have learned to be thankful for all gifts—great and small.  As the recipient of a gift, it is NOT my responsibility to QUESTION WHY a gift is chosen, but to ACCEPT the gift with a grateful heart.  To be remembered is what is important.  Miss Emily, for whatever reason, CHOSE that gift for me.  She found great meaning in it and who was I to question the motives or meaning.  She gave freely and without expectation.

I heard a teacher on TV this week say that she was one who was appreciative for every gift she got.  She loved all the mugs and the handmade ornaments because they were given in love.  I have a friend who is a teacher who PROBABLY has every gift a child gave her and she displays them at Christmas and smiles to recount each gift and who gave it to her.  I have another friend who COMPLAINED about EVERY gift she ever got as a teacher.  She would show me how “hokey” and “cheap” each gift was and she had no idea WHY they bothered because she was simply going to throw it away!

I am so THANKFUL for that gift of a box of Kleenex.  While, at the time, I thought it was an AWFUL gift, it has become one of my most favorite gifts of all time because it TAUGHT me to say THANKS for all gifts that I received that were given in love.  Yes, there are gifts we all get that we have no need for them, but then, SOMETIMES the gift is NOT about us…it is about the GIVER.  The Bible says to LET ALL YOU DO, BE DONE IN LOVE…that means accepting a gift that is freely given and chosen just for us.

I know the feeling of giving a gift to someone and getting a nasty remark and NEVER do I want to make someone feel the way she made me feel.  Yes, she was a teenager, but that is NOT an excuse.  SHE took every ounce of the JOY I had in selecting the gift and she too, taught me a lesson.  As Children of God, we must be kind.  This person made me wonder if everything I had tried to teach her in Sunday School was a waste.  I hope not...

Funny, the lessons we learn in life from such simple moments…

Today, I share with you a symbol of CHRISTMAS memories to me…WHO hasn’t made a REINDEER Candy Cane?  I can remember Mother making them when I was in about the 3^rd grade and I am sure we made them every year…I can’t open a drawer that I don’t find some WIGGLY eyes!  We would put them in gifts of spice tea mix, or hot chocolate mix…with cakes we baked, or to the kids at church, to the elderly at the nursing home…we knew they weren’t GRAND gestures, but they made people smile and it was just a very small something to say, HEY, I TOOK a moment to make something and I think YOU are worth the time I spent on it!!

Isn’t that what Christmas is about?  Spreading the LOVE…it isn’t the expensive gifts wrapped beautifully under a tree, but just the thought that in LOVE, you choose to FREELY give, just as God sent HIS ONLY SON to save us and NOT to condemn us…Pretty awesome, isn’t it!! …I hope at some point in your life that you get a “box of Kleenex-type gift”…Blessings to YOU…~charlotte♥