My gift to you is a story about a little girl who woke up to nothing under the Christmas tree --She never noticed there was nothing, and I mean NOTHING under the tree except a pair of mittens and hat for her and her brother, wrapped in red paper and green ribbons from their mother.
What she did notice was the beautiful tree, the music and her Mom crying. She didn't understand why her mother was crying because it was Christmas and she didn't think she (or her brother) had done anything wrong to make her mother cry.
The mother, recently divorced had depended on the father to keep to his promise and buy all the presents that year as the mother was suddenly a single mom to 2 small children and had spent what savings she had to enroll in business school so she could get a job and keep a roof over their heads.
None of that mattered to the little girl, all that mattered to her was that her mother was crying.
The next year, the mother was determined not to have nothing but a skirt under the tree. She scrimped and saved and Santa bought EVERYTHING the little girl and boy wanted.
That year it was the little girl who cried. The mother was the one confused... the children got everything they ever said they wanted that year. The mother asked why the little girl was crying because Santa got her everything she wanted.
The little girl looked at her mother and said... "Santa got me presents, but you didn't get me anything. Why didn't you get me mittens and a hat this year?"
The mother had given Santa all the credit... and all that went through the daughters head was, her mother had forgotten about her.
That night, the little girl understood that her mother WAS Santa. That her mother had been the one to do everything, and she understood now why the mother didn't have a winter coat. Living in New England, a good winter coat is a NEED. She understood why her mother had gone without a LOT that year.
The little girl curled up with her mother that night and told her that she loved her and she promised not to tell her baby brother the 'secret' and wanted her mother to bring back some of the things, so her mother could have a winter coat.
