“The stockings were hung by the chimney with care...” The stockings were handknit by my grandmother for each of us. Our names carefully crafted in the yarn, magically spelling Cheryl, Robin and Christie.
They hung from the mantle, all decorated for Christmas. The handcarved, olive wood camels, given as a gift from our minister, when he and his family had traveled to Bethlehem one year, always marched across the top. The Christmas tree, stood beautifully decorated, completed a week before. Each ornament put on carefully, each piece of tinsel put on strand by strand. In my family, decorating the tree was a tradition that we all participated in, but I know that after we had gone to bed, my mother rearranged some of those ornaments to her liking, so the larger ones were on the bottom and the smaller ones were on the top. My father was very meticulous about placing the lights on the tree. It would take him forever to weave the strings in and out of each branch so that not one wire was showing when he was finished. It was part of who he was, making sure he took his time, with great patience, (sometimes frustratingly so for those waiting) to do a job just right. All of this exacting tradition was what we knew growing up. In fact, I assumed that every family celebrated in the perfect way that we did. My mother would make hot chocolate with mini marshmallows floating in it. She would pop popcorn and we would eat some and string some, with cranberries in between. Strips of red and green paper would be pasted to make long paper chains to adorn the tree. But none of this was overdone, it was all done perfectly. At least that is how I remember it.
On Christmas Eve, my mother would read the Christmas Story from the Bible, and The Night Before Christmas. We sat on the floor in the living room, the fireplace glowing with perfect logs, and special advent candles burning. My sisters and I, in our pajamas, listening to her read, and probably imagining the sugarplums dancing in our heads, and the Wise Men following the star.
Yes, the stockings were hung, in hopes that St. Nicholas soon would be there. And I would barely be able to sleep Christmas Eve night, thinking of the shape that those stockings would assume in the dim light of the early morning hour when I would creep down the stairs from my bedroom and peek into the living room. The presents mounded under the tree, that had magically appeared during the night, my knitted stocking all lumpy and hanging low and heavy on its hook.
It is a beautiful memory, one that I can relive over and over through my years. That memory is more special than any of the gifts that I had so anxiously waited for. There isn’t one of those gifts that I can recall, but the memory of that scene, allows me to become a child once again.
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