My new dress socks have an unexpected feature: Time travel.
As I opened a gift from my mother-in-law Friday, I saw the golden toes. Unbeknownst to her, it’s the same brand my grandmother used to send me every Christmas up until she died.
I thought briefly about how frustrated I was the first few times I received those socks with the reinforced toes, but over time I grew to love this gesture from my grandma. To this day, every time I put on a pair of that brand of socks, I think about my grandmother.
Then I thought back about opening those packages of socks as a youth. If you’ve never experienced a Christmas morning with a large family, you really don’t know what chaos is.
Each year, our parents reminded us we couldn’t go downstairs until everyone was awake and ready to open presents. The younger children made sure everyone was awake by 7, although we generally started our campaign to begin the holiday by shaking siblings around 5:30.
Finally, when everyone was ready, my dad would go downstairs to set up the video recorder. We had one well before there were camcorders or cellphone videos, and we have grainy black and white memories from some of those celebrations in the early 1980s.
Our parents always told us we recorded Christmas to show both sets of grandparents, who lived out of state, our reactions to their presents. I think it was so they could try to watch the reactions of all seven children as they opened their presents simultaneously, in a ticker-tape parade of wrapping paper shreds tossed about in between high-pitched squeals of “thank you, Grandma and Grandpa!”
Most years, we’d watch that video moments after taping it. It helped me realize Christmas morning wasn’t just about my gifts. It was about enjoying the company of my siblings, seeing what truly excited them as they opened their gifts.
Then my mind turned to our current-day festivities at the same house where I grew up. It always seemed cozy for the seven of us children, and now it’s even cozier as we bring spouses and our own children into that confined space. I knew my wife was the one for me when she didn’t get claustrophobic during her first Christmas afternoon there.
The adults generally don’t exchange presents anymore, but it’s still fun to see the children open their gifts from my parents, mugging for them with their own high-pitched squeals of “thank you, Grandma and Grandpa.”
The reality hits that some day, all they’ll have are fond memories of this, too. They may not remember the particular present, but they will remember these festive holiday gatherings. They’ll remember that as much as they talked about gifts leading up to today, it’s really more about these moments with their family that matter.
They’ll realize it’s all so fleeting. Some day, all they’ll have are memories of these loved ones as they open a present that reminds them of someone they lost long ago.
But for now, on Christmas, it’s a joyous occasion, as it should be. It’s a celebration of the birth of our savior, and it’s a celebration of family, nostalgia and the love that savior brought to us.
In the past, in the present and in the future, it is indeed a merry Christmas.
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