Christmas Miracles
A Long Ago Christmas Memory
by Patricia Crisafulli
The old farm on a dirt road in the backwoods of northern New York State was described to me so many times, I can imagine the place, even though I never saw it: the big frame house with the wide porch, the pair of maple trees out front, and the barn in the back where my grandparents kept a cow or two, pigs and chickens, and a team of work horses.
That old house came alive for me in dozens of stories that my mother told, of how she and her sisters grew up there during the Depression. The stories had that long-ago feel not only because of the years that had passed, but also because of the era: tales of riding in a horse and buggy in the summer and a horse and sleigh in the winter. My grandfather owned an old Model A Ford, but the tires were patched beyond repair and there was no money for gasoline.
One story that has always stayed with me was of a particular Christmas in the early 1930s, a time my mother remember as the "depths of the Depression," and there was no money. In order to pay the interest on the mortgage, to keep the bank from foreclosing on the farm, my grandfather needed a relatively small sum. The amount I remember being told was $13, but for the little they had in those days it might as well have been $13,000.
Tested by trouble and sorrows, my grandparents relied on their deep and abiding faith. As Psalm 34 tells us, I sought the Lord, and he answered me, and delivered me from all my fears. The answer to their prayers was to be found right in their own backyard with gifts of the earth. My grandmother went into the woods to gather bushel baskets full of ground pine, with green sprouts like miniature boughs that spread in great patches along the earth. From willow branches she made hoops, around which she bound the ground pine to make wreathes.
She sat up all night making wreaths, enough to fill a large hamper basket, which my grandfather strapped to his back. At four in the morning, he hopped a ride on the milk train into Syracuse, where he went door-to-door selling wreathes. Night after night, my grandmother made wreaths, and day after day my grandfather sold them.
As Christmas approached, my grandmother had saved coupons that came in tins of coffee to get a Kewpie doll for her daughters. The only other things she gave them were mittens she knit herself.
Then on Christmas Eve, my grandfather came home from the last day of selling wreaths, exhausted but relieved. The farm was safe for another year. From what he had earned, he had a dime left over, which he spent on his beloved wife to buy her a powder puff. That night, my grandmother gave him her surprise: enough money from selling butter and eggs all year to buy four new tires for the Model A Ford.
Hearing this story as a child, my head was too full of the Sears & Roebuck "Wish Book" catalog to really comprehend it. As an adult, I try to fathom living with no money at all. What lingers in my heart, however, is the love of my grandparents for each other: the dashing young American soldier in World War I and the beautiful French girl he met overseas and then returned to her country to marry.
Many years, thousands of miles, and untold hardships later, that love continued. During a very dark December, they found a way together to keep the farm and the family together. And so it would always be for them.
Patricia Crisafulli is a writer, published author, and founder of www.FaithHopeandFiction.com, a monthly e-literary magazine with stories, essays, and poetry to inspire and entertain.
Christmas Miracles by Cecil Murphey & Marley Gibson is the perfect book to help you get in the right frame of mind for the holidays by reminding you of what Christmas is really all about. The authors have taken true stories from a variety of authors about their own Christmas miracles. Births, deaths, injuries, and poverty are themes all touched on here, each with their own message of hope and faith. I definitely recommend keeping a box of tissues handy while reading. The stories are overflowing with emotion and written to remind readers that Christmas is a time of miracles, starting with the first one over two thousand years ago with the birth of a baby boy in a manger who came to save the world. Some miracles in this story are of the huge, biblical variety, others are far smaller, more a matter of the heart, but each is a reminder that God loves each and every one of us.
Today is another opportunity for you to sign up for the chance to win a strand of pearls as described above. Just leave a comment and you're in! I'm also running two other contests this week: #1 Go to my post for Dec. 13th and answer one of the questions I ask by leaving a comment on that post. Contest ends Dec. 20th at 10 pm. #2 I'm giving away a copy of C.D. Baker's 40 Loaves. It's a daily devotional read in less than ten minutes that will change your life. To sign up for that contest, send me an email before 10 pm on Thursday, Dec. 17th. Good luck!
1 comments:
enter me to win a strand of pearls Jenni T CMH
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