A Christmas Story
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I generally try to tell y'all a story around Christmas. The story this year is not mine, it's my neighbor's.
Steve is about as country as a turnip green. A proud graduate of Negreet High School, he grew up mostly on military bases in his younger days, as the service tends to move people around. Married young, put himself through college working as a bricklayer. Started out as a bi-vocational pastor, then went full-time as he pastored larger churches, picking up his doctorate somewhere along the line.
Preachers all have their favorite sermons. One of Steve's is about the different meanings of the word "present". For instance, the Babe in the Manger was God's present of eternal life to mankind, a gift the required God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit being present in a manger in Bethlehem
But woven into this sermon of the greatest present of all, are illustrations of great and life-changing presents given by people and what they have meant to the people who received them. One is about Steve's best Christmas present.
It was December 24, 1969. Steve was a young boy, holding his momma's hand, waiting on the base tarmac for the plane to finish taxiing and for the passengers to disembark. He hadn't seen his daddy in over a year, but his daddy was on that plane. Daddy was home from Vietnam.
Like most kids his age, Steve had poured over the Sears Wish Book, making sure to note every toy he wanted and he sure did want a lot of them. But in 1969, a serviceman doesn't make a lot of money, even if his wife can help out by working a job. And in order to work, Steve and his mom had to live with grandpa and grandma, because they watched Steve while momma worked. So, Steve knew he was limited to one reasonable gift, and just one. To give you an idea of what things cost in those days, momma had been working some OT, in order to buy Steve's daddy an extra special Christmas gift...A brand new recliner, which cost the princely sum of $40.
Steve had gone to his mother, Wish Book in hand. The toy he really, really wanted, was an electric race car set, but it cost $14.95. He told his mom he wanted the toy drum set, because it was only $7.95 and mom could use the extra $7 to help buy his daddy's recliner. As luck would have it, Steve's daddy was going to need that recliner.
He'd made it almost through his tour unscathed and was making his plans to do his best to get home for Christmas. Then life threw him a curveball. Two weeks before getting on the big bird home, he was attacked while sleeping. Of all things by a big rat. A rat that bit him all over his face and clawed at his eyes. A rabid rat. Steve's dad had to have multiple stitches all over his face to close the wounds and antibiotics to try to keep them from getting infected. In Vietnam, everything seemed to get infected. The worst thing was the rabies shots. 21 shots in the abdomen, every day for 21 days. miss your daily shot, and you start the series all over again.
I don't know how Steve's dad talked them into letting him go home. Somehow, they arranged for the shots to be taken in-route, as his flight made it's stops and transfers. They would finish at his home base hospital. Steve's dad was supposed to be on that taxiing airplane, Christmas Eve, 1969. And he was. Although Steve didn't recognize his on dad at first.
When Steve's daddy left home, he was a strapping 200 pound man, an inch over six feet tall. The man who walked down those stairs, was as brown as an Indian and as lean as any man Steve had ever seen. 145 pounds of rawhide and skinned-cat muscles. Plus, it didn't help that much of his face was zig-zagged with stitches, seemingly everywhere. Mama was sure glad to see him, though, stitches and all. And daddy was crying, something Steve had never seen his daddy do. After hugs and kisses, they loaded up into the car and drove back to Grandpa's house. Everybody was excited to have Steve's dad home and they even forgot to put Steve to bed at his usual time (forget, yeah). Daddy eventually made Steve go to bed and he tucked him in, something that momma usually did.
Nobody was up the next morning, when Steve slid his feet into his slippers and headed down the hall to check out the Christmas tree. Whatever he was to get for Christmas, would be waiting under the tree. His present was certainly there...A red drumset, with a drum pedal, sticks, a cymbal and everything! What's a boy to do with a new drumset?
Well, wail the tar out of it, wouldn't you think? Lo, and behold, that's exactly what happened. Didn't take but just a few licks, until here came Steve's mom down the hallway,
fussing at him to leave his drumset alone, because his daddy was sleeping.His daddy wasn't sleeping, though. His daddy was about three steps behind his fussing mother, telling her to leave that boy alone and let him play those drums. His dad sank down into his new recliner, wearing nothing but his G.I. boxer shorts, kicked up the footrest and told Steve to play away. It was the best music he'd ever heard, exactly what he'd been looking forward to for months.
Many years later, Steve still remembers his best Christmas present. It happened Christmas morning, 1969. It was his skinny, brown, scar-faced daddy, sitting in his chair wearing just his boxer shorts with momma getting hugged in his lap, while Steve wailed away on a $7.95 red Sear's drumset.
Daddy was home and everything was right in the world...
Always remember, Operation Valkyrie was an act of sedition.
Warning: I post things that interest me. Read and comment at your own discretion. -
It's a true story. Same as the one I tell about Ray playing Santa in a Z71 pickup or about the little girl begging God and Santa Claus to let her daddy live for Christmas. Or about the little Asian girl dancing with joy through the aisles of a piano store while my wife played Silver Bells.
There are stories all around us, many which can make us think about the better and worst things about life in a special season. You just have to stop and see, not just look...
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@kluurs said in A Christmas Story:
Thanks, Jolly, That made the day a little nicer - which is what you intended. You've got a good heart.
Let's not go overboard, shall we?
Steve was my pastor for fifteen years or so. He was my boy's baseball coach for several years. Shucks, he lives down the road a piece, maybe a couple of miles. He's sneaky smart...The country boy who would be right at home sitting on your living room couch with a guitar singing (badly) every hit Johnny Cash ever had. Or arguing the finer points of Calvinism vs. Arminianism on that same couch. He's the rare combination of pastor and powerful preacher, that can build churches from little congregations in a rented building to churches with a thousand members. I know, I've seen him do it three times.
I'm just retelling his story I've heard multiple times...
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