Christmas Memory

Just before dawn, my sister Betsy and I are creeping down the stairs, our sleepy parents behind us, at six a.m. The tree is huge, spectacular, and throwing pokey, rainbow shadows on the walls. We cut it down in our own backyard, had to wire it to the wall so it wouldn't fall over.

We take in the display of Christmas booty, I swear it glittered like treasure, beneath this giant evergreen. An art set, opened with the brushes carefully fanned next to shiny watercolors. A pink doll stroller. For Betsy, a Little Lady Buggy, holding a tiny doll passenger and looking every bit as charming as it sounds. At age eight and two, we think we have hit the mother load.

I love my presents, but even more, I'm thrilled to watch my sister. Her pigtails are cockeyed from the day before and I'm thinking how adorable she looks, how fun it is to share this morning with a sibling. I'm showing her how the little buggy works and how to hold the doll like a real baby. This is the first Christmas she has any idea who Santa Claus is.

Contentment settles over me as I sit in the middle of toys and lights. I will never want another thing as long as I live. I can't even imagine there is no Santa Claus. Next year would be a different story but, for this morning, my sister and I are both so excited about this guy who indulged us like we never thought our parents would.

No matter how it really was, I think the rainbow lights must have been more vivid and bright that Christmas than you can get them now. The tree must have been stolen from a production of The Nutcracker. And Santa must have been real, if only for that moment.