a xmas story about my daughter

For my daughter's second Christmas, I invited all her dad's relatives over for Christmas Eve dinner. We lived in his hometown at the time and all my relatives were five hundred miles away.  My ex's family initially acted weird about my invitation, their feathers seemingly ruffled that some interloper was hijacking the family holiday. I had chosen Christmas Eve because I knew the whole clan gathered at the matriarch's home for Christmas Day dinner. And I would have been just fine if no one came.

The sisters, my ex's four shrew sisters, consulted and decided maybe I was not being a bitch to host my ex's grandparents, parents, four sisters and their spouses for those who had any that year and his brother, his wife, and his niece and nephews.

I planned carefully, checking with my mother-in-law to be sure I didn't cook any of her sacred holiday cows. She did turkey so I did a pork loin roast.

I fussed especially over dessert. I wanted it to be something holiday-y but distinct. I pored over cookbooks and magazines. I settled on a recipe for some snowballs.

I did not realize at the time that everything I said to my husband as I planned and fretted to get everything right, he told is family. There was a background greek chorus critiquing every choice I even considered.

They did not approve of my dessert choice. Or the pork loin. Or the fact that I planned to give all the children gifts but not any adults. This criticism I still don't get. They exchanged gifts on Christmas day, going so far as to make all the little kids wait until Christmas evening after dinner to open their gifts. I thought giving each of the kids a small, inexpensive toy was a nice touch. I still do.

I gave my nephew Nick a small periscope, one designed to be used underater. The eye of that periscope could be turned so the child could view around corners or from under the water in the pool.Nick, who was as adorable as any little boy I have known, soon got into running around the house, then spying with his periscope around corners. It was a gift for all to see his joy.

I don't remember what I got Nick's sister Carrie, Nick's brother Matt or my own daughter Rosie.

Rosie was 18 months old, walking, not talking so anyone but me could understand her.

Rosie's great grandfather, on her dad's side of course, was from Croatia. He had emigrated during a round of genocide in Yugoslavia to work in the meat packing houses of South Omaha.  He was Catholic but I often questioned his Catholicism. I always had an instinct his maternal grandparents, who spoke with thick accents even after living in this country fifty years or more, had crossed over, that they had been another religion and converted to Catholicism in their underinformed belief that whatever faith they had had in Yugoslavia would not be welcome in America.  Who knows? They were so far from my notions I had of Catholics, and, trust me, I knew Catholics, having gone to Catholic schools K-12, with my aunt the nun entering her final vows the day after she stood as my godmother at my christening. Having a nun in the family wasn't quite as good as having a priest but my aunt the nun was what we had. My aunt, parenthetically, left the convent after 47 years. I am sure about the number of years because she became a nun when I was christened and she left the convent t marry a divorced Episcopal priest when I was 47. That's a good story.

Her husband had been married when they met and fell instantly in love. They decided Bill had to keep his vows to his wife, that they could not be together. My aunt went to be a missionary in Guatemala, partly to serve selflessly, partly for adventure I think and partly to grieve at a remove from Bill. A couple years in the Guatemalan jungle and Bill appeared with a free pass to marry my aunt. His wife, happily for all, had decided she was a lesbian. Bill had a a free exit and could remarry guilt-free. Episcopalians don't reject divorce the way the formal Catholic church does. Most Catholics I know are divorced, then remarry, but it is all sorta ignored.

I just looked up at my post title:  a xmas story about my daughter.

As we readied for that Christmas Eve party, with our own dear angel glad in a purple velour pants suit looking like a pale lavendar angel to us, my husband looked out our patio doors and saw a dead bird whose head had gotten caught in the peep hole of a bird house in our backyard. He said "I better remove that. If my grandpa sees it, he will be spooked. He is very superstitious."  I thought but did not say "You seem pretty superstitious yourself" but I also felt some fondness, seeing how eager my husband was to please his grandpa.

I learned that one of that family's Christmas traditions was that Crotian grandpa gave all the small children money at Christmas. He handed out small amounts of cash to all the kids, with my purple angel included. She could barely walk. And the purple velour pants suit had no pockets. I don't think any of her clothes had pockets at the time. Babies didn't need pockets. And I tended to buy clothes for her with simple lines, never ascribing to the practice of dressing up little girls in frills.

I had stepped out of the kitchen, stepped away from the last minute rush of getting food out onto the table when I saw her great-grandpa hand her two rolled-up one dollar bills. She rushed away from him, as if she wanted to get away before anyone decided to take that money back. Clearly she knew money was a fine thing to have and she demonstrated that she had seen people, probably her father, put money in a pocket.

As my tiny purple, velour, beatific, and toddling awkwardly angel walked away from her great grandpa's gift distribution line, she tried repeatedly to stuff those two dollars into a pocket. I watcher her father step in to tell her she had no pocket. Then I stepped in and suggested she might put the two dollars in her dad's pocket, and trust him to give it back.

She was too young to want to actively spend the money. The other kids were all old enough to decide to spend it on candy.  I don't recall her dad ever fussing with her about spending the money.

Her father and I separated a few weeks later. He may have revived that two dollar gift but I doubt it. He did not tend to think of small things.

Here I am, 32 years later, remembering Rosie rushing through my living room, trying to stuff those two dollars into a nonexistent pocket.

It is such a small memory.

It was such a wonderful moment, the kind of small, wonderful moments that add up to a wonderful life.

I began to keep a look out for clothes that would fit her that had pockets. And thus began our foray in Oshkosh b'Gosh pastel corduroy overalls. They had pockets and were, imho, adorbs.

Rosie, I miss and love you. I know someone is giving you gifts as wonderful and as magical as those two folded one dollar bills. The gift, of course, was the love of her great grandpa and being included with the big kids and the magic of Christmas still alive, I hope, for most children.

No Christmas these days for me. So I spelunk in my memories.