When I was small,
small as a sock lost behind the dryer,
the TV glowed like a fireplace made of snow,
and December smelled like popcorn, pine,
and the promise of staying up past bedtime.
There were cartoons that cracked like icicles,
reindeer with opinions,
snowmen who sang before melting into puddles of hope,
and a certain grumpy man who learned -
every single year -
that love does not come with receipts.
I watched them all
with my chin in my hands
and my feet in footie pajamas,
believing - truly believing -
that miracles came scheduled,
right after the commercials.
Years cartwheeled by.
The rabbit ears bent.
The TV got flatter.
The world got louder.
But every December,
something inside me still clicks on
like an old set warming up,
that soft hummmm of memory,
and there they are again.
The stop-motion heroes.
The caroling ghosts.
The misfit toys who look suspiciously like us now.
I watch them with older eyes,
eyes that know the ending
and still lean forward anyway.
Because somehow,
after half a century of calendars and coffee cups
and news that never sleeps,
those old movies still whisper the same spell:
Be kind.
Believe a little.
Laugh at the cold.
And never - ever -
outgrow the magic
of a story that knows your name.
So I sit there, smiling,
with tinsel in my heart
and a child on my shoulder,
and we both agree -
Some things don’t age.
They just keep coming home for Christmas.
GBS jr
2008
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