Dear Santa......

[democrank]

Dear Santa,

One Christmas past leaps front and center each year, just as it did today while I was stringing popcorn and cranberries for my tree. It was a Christmas so sad that it made me declare it my best ever, just for the lessons it taught me about what`s really important. Easy for me to say now that I`m an adult, but back then I was stunned to wake up Christmas morning to find you had forgotten to stop at our house, even though I had written to request a toy hammer for my brother and some LifeSavers for my sister. I wanted to ask my parents about your apparent oversight, but one was passed out and the other gone. Later that day, as if left by a Christmas angel, I found a can of pineapple in our usually bare cupboard. Pineapples weren`t something you`d normally find at our house, so that`s how I learned miracles never cease. Somehow, that can ended up where it was needed the most, hammer or no hammer.

The ache of that Christmas made me very sensitive toward little children, so I`m asking that you do your best this year to remember all the forgotten ones. Nothing big and fancy, mind you, but maybe a brand new box of crayons, a pair of colorful mittens, or even one of those old fashioned wooden paddles with the elasticized ball attached. If you`re very careful, you can spread a lot of joy with a small amount of effort. I remember a little girl last year who acted like she had been named Princess of the Year all because of a Dollar Store package of pastel butterfly barrettes.

Sometimes it DOES take a village. Sometimes it takes just a willingness to bend down and smile. Or offer a candy cane. Or listen. Or retrieve a dropped mitten. Children`s lives can be touched by the simplest acts of kindness and lessons about miracles taught with the meaningful gift of love.

[Jeffersons Ghost]

1. K&R... there's two... nice OP

odd how people who used to get lots of comments and recommendations here at DU, now slip quietly down the board with hardly a whisper, isn't it?