Christmas Present (And Past)
Every family has it's own Christmas traditions. Just recently I saw examples of many different ones, lots of them involving the opening of gifts on Christmas eve. There was a time once, when I was looked upon with scorn at the mention of opening presents any other time besides Christmas morning. But there's a reason why our family still does its opening the Night Before Christmas.
My parents were divorced when I was four. I grew up an only child surrounded by three adults...my mother, and my grandparents. Although it wasn't a case of 'they live downstairs, we live upstairs', my mother and I had sort of seperate quarters on the second floor. My grandparents put up the 'downstairs' tree early, but upstairs........nothing. Santa did it all. There was no tree, no ornaments...no nothing until after I went to bed on Christmas Eve. It was the one sure way to freak a kid out....have her walk in and find a fully decorated tree with a massive mound of presents under it where before there was nothing.
The adults had their gift exchange on Christmas Eve because on Christmas morning they had to come and watch the Main Event....the headlining act....the showstopper.......... yes, that would be me. They all watched me open gifts as if witnessing the biggest hit on Broadway. Of course...I WAS a child. I believed in Santa Claus. It never occurred to me that the gifts these people were ooohing and aaaahing over had just been assembled and wrapped BY them a couple of hours before. You know that phrase 'and what to my wondering eyes should appear'? That was me. Wondering eyes, trying to take in all that Christmassy goodness...stunned into slack-jawed silence every time. And my poor mother....I know there were times that she'd barely dropped into bed before I came along in all my goofy kid glory and made her wake up to see what Santa'd brought.
After a few years they started letting me pick one thing that I could open on Christmas Eve, then, when everyone involved was certain that I'd gone beyond Santa, I joined them in the Christmas Eve ritual.
And that's still how we do it.
My parents were divorced when I was four. I grew up an only child surrounded by three adults...my mother, and my grandparents. Although it wasn't a case of 'they live downstairs, we live upstairs', my mother and I had sort of seperate quarters on the second floor. My grandparents put up the 'downstairs' tree early, but upstairs........nothing. Santa did it all. There was no tree, no ornaments...no nothing until after I went to bed on Christmas Eve. It was the one sure way to freak a kid out....have her walk in and find a fully decorated tree with a massive mound of presents under it where before there was nothing.
The adults had their gift exchange on Christmas Eve because on Christmas morning they had to come and watch the Main Event....the headlining act....the showstopper.......... yes, that would be me. They all watched me open gifts as if witnessing the biggest hit on Broadway. Of course...I WAS a child. I believed in Santa Claus. It never occurred to me that the gifts these people were ooohing and aaaahing over had just been assembled and wrapped BY them a couple of hours before. You know that phrase 'and what to my wondering eyes should appear'? That was me. Wondering eyes, trying to take in all that Christmassy goodness...stunned into slack-jawed silence every time. And my poor mother....I know there were times that she'd barely dropped into bed before I came along in all my goofy kid glory and made her wake up to see what Santa'd brought.
After a few years they started letting me pick one thing that I could open on Christmas Eve, then, when everyone involved was certain that I'd gone beyond Santa, I joined them in the Christmas Eve ritual.
And that's still how we do it.