The Best Gifts at Christmas

By : Butch Dale

   Do you remember the best gifts you received for Christmas when you were a youngster?  Perhaps it was that new Schwinn bicycle…maybe a Red Ryder B-B gun, a Lionel train set, a Nintendo game set…or perhaps a cute Cabbage Patch doll, a Barbie playhouse, a beautiful bracelet with your name engraved on it. We all have memories of Christmas gifts from our childhood years…many happy, some funny, and a few disappointing I suppose.

   The first gifts that I can recall receiving (when I was about four years old) were a Gene Autry capgun, holster, and cowboy hat. My cousin who lived across the road also received the same items, and we wore these for months.

   With five of us kids, it was often difficult for my folks to scrape up enough money to buy very many presents. Mom and Dad were both born in 1924, so they were five years old when the Great Depression started in 1929…tough times for most families. My father told me that for Christmas, he and his five siblings usually received an apple or orange and one gift…clothing or a toy. His favorite gift was a pair of leather boots with a pouch on one side that held a small pocket knife. My mother also came from a large family…she had five brothers and a sister. She told me that most of their gifts were homemade, but one year she received an art set. That gift changed her life, as she became an extraordinary artist…drawing, painting, and also decorating hundreds and hundreds of “senior cords” for high school students.

   My Grandpa and Grandma Dale could not afford to buy gifts for all of their grandkids…after all, there were twenty-two of us. But Grandma always made several dozen sugar cookies for all us, and they were the best! My Grandpa and Grandma Grimes always gave us “practical” presents. One year I received a pair of cufflinks and a tie clasp…the next year a pair of nail clippers. Oh well, I knew it was the thought that counts.

   From an early age on, I went to Sunday school at the Methodist church. In fact, I earned an attendance award for not missing a Sunday in ten years. I believe this helped to shape my opinion of what Christmas should be…not an emphasis on receiving gifts, but instead…giving gifts to others and honoring the birth of Jesus. However, little kids love to receive presents, and I was no different. I don’t recall receiving any expensive gifts, but there were some that stick out in my mind….

   When I was ten years old in 1958, I received a Daisy B-B rifle, which had been displayed in the showcase at Alvie Warren’s hardware store. It was one of my favorite presents, and I practically wore it out shooting it. The next year, my brother and I wrote out an extensive wish list of items from the Sears and Roebuck catalog. Santa must have had a rough year, as I only received a baseball, a shirt, a pair of socks, and a tube of Brylcreem hair tonic. But two years later, Santa recovered his finances and I received a baseball mitt and Milwaukee Braves hat…my best presents ever!

   I think that many of you will agree that Christmas has become much too commercialized today. Some children receive more gifts on Christmas day than I received total in the seventeen years I spent at home before heading off to college. Some of my best memories are the Christmas programs at school and in church, walking around town with other members of the Methodist Youth Fellowship and singing carols, and just being with all of the Dale family aunts, uncles, and cousins for a big get-together and pitch-in meal on Christmas afternoon and evening.

   The best present for me each year is to have everyone healthy and happy. But I will admit, the delight in opening those “special” gifts when I was a child are still floating around in my mind.