A Christmas Wish
From Ross Morse
My favorite Christmas memory cannot be summed up with one event, but
with a multitude of Christmases spanning my early childhood.
If Santa Claus is Father Christmas then my “little Nana” will
forever be Mother Christmas. “Little Nana” wasn’t, in fact, little. I
remember her to stand towering over me at heights reserved for the early
NBA days. We called her “little Nana” because her mom was “big Nana”. I
never quite understood until my older years why this never sat well with
“big Nana”, but nonetheless, “little Nana” had a lock on Christmas all
year long. It seemed she would begin preparing for the next year’s
Christmas as soon as the present year’s had passed. As the holidays drew
nearer, my anticipation grew and grew.
We spent our Christmas Eves with “little Nana”. Memories come
flooding back of a Christmas tree covered with Angel Hair, a roast pig
complete with apple in mouth, a roast duck sans apple, aunts, uncles,
cousins and goody bags... The goody bags were my little Nana’s greatest
gift to us kids. Goody bags needn’t be reserved for after dinner or
whatever other timeframe the parents would extend to us in order to
maintain Seasonal civility. Goody bags were paper grocery store bags,
filled with little trinkets and candies, a pre-cursor to the wonderfully
large presents wrapped under the Christmas tree, the largest of which we
all hoped was for us.
Little Nana understood very well that Christmas was meant for us
children. I can’t recall a single gift she received, but I remember
unwrapping red shoelace licorice, 2 liter bottles of Mt. Dew, and some
evil toy that would only be allowed to be played with because little
Nana gave it to us and she said it was “OK” as long as nobody wound up
in the hospital for Christmas.
Little Nana taught me about how Christmas lasts all year long
without saying a word. She almost singlehandedly shaped the way I see
Christmas even now. I know no matter how hard I try, I won’t be able to
master the holiday like she did, but she should know, no one ever will
and I won’t stop trying.
My wish for you this Christmas is to feel the way I felt jumping in
the car on my way to little Nana’s. And if you can’t feel that, I hope
you’re feeling the way my little Nana felt when she saw all of us
tearing through our goody bags.
Merry Christmas!
