All I Want for Christmas

Ivy is singing Jingle Bells again in that wonderful Broadway Baby voice of hers. She has an incredible vibrato for a five year old and her voice has always been, well, Big. As a three year old she used to ask me with a puzzled face, “Why didn’t God give me a girl’s voice?” She doesn’t ask that any more, but she sings vigorously and often.

She just asked me, in all seriousness, “Should I just keep singing Jingle Bellls or should I sometimes switch to something else?”

“Well, you sing Jingle Bells really well, but it would be nice sometimes tossing in something else, too, wouldn’t it?”

“I don’t know. That’s why I asked you.”

She has a birthday coming up in two weeks and then Christmas, and she has diligently pored over the Toy R Us catalog for weeks, crayon in hand, carefully circling and and writing her name beside every item she likes. She returns to the catalog again and again and considers her choices with an expert eye. A few items have been crossed out while others have been highlighted with more black crayon circles or rays emanating from the original circle.

Last night she inititated an earnest discussion about what she really wanted for her birthday - a baby doll, a doll’s bathtub, a bottle and some doll clothes. Maybe a stroller. She has always used very adult-looking hand gestures, fingers extended and close together, first one hand, and then (“on the other hand. . ." ), the other. Her eyebrows are very active when she hits the urgent points.

The doll is important, but not the one pictured in the bathtub, “because its eyes are kind of weird, but maybe that is just because the person who drew the catalog (it is all photos) didn’t do a very good job, so if I had to have that doll it would be OK, I guess, but I really want the bathtub and a bottle to feed the doll with.” Then she worried that her presents would not be a surprise if I bought exactly what she had just asked for. But, she decided, again gesturing earnestly, that would be OK if I did not tell her which one she was getting for her birthday and which one for Christmas. “Don’t you think that would be OK?” Yes, I think it would be OK.

I also have a birthday coming up, five days before hers. I don’t look forward to mine quite as eagerly as she does, and I have neglected the pre-birthday ritual of circling items that I want and calling them to the attention of the appropriate person – I know he can’t afford a diamond this year, either! But my best gifts are either already here, or soon on the way. Six years ago Ivy was my best late birthday present and early Christmas gift – a gift to last a lifetime, as they say. I don’t remember how I celebrated my birthday that year, but I vividly remember the day my favorite gift arrived.

This year my big present will also be belated, though, I hope, by only one day. My firstborn is booked on a flight that arrives in Kuala Lumpur the morning after I turn “the new 30.” We have begun discussing how we will greet her – the best suggestion so far came from P who thinks we should all wear those black plastic glasses with the fake noses and mustaches. Just in case we don’t stand out in the crowd sufficiently already. But the details are entirely incidental. This gift, welcoming my daughter back from her first extended stay abroad, has been nineteen years in the making and, I’m sure, will be worth every minute of preparation and waiting.

So this Advent season I am enjoying the gift of an unexpected child who arrived long after I thought Anyone would give me that kind of gift, and I am waiting patiently for the homecoming of another child. I think of the carol I love, “Come Thou long-expected Jesus,” though I am really thinking of Anna, but I know that God is pleased to use our human longings and experiences to remind us of heavenly realities. During this month of reminiscense and anticipation I can remember another birth, even more remarkable and unexpected by the mother. . . I can look forward to the arrival of another Person I love and long to see, whose flight plans are not yet known.

Come, Thou long expected Jesus

Born to set Thy people free;

From our fears and sins release us,

Let us find our rest in Thee.

Israel’s Strength and Consolation,

Hope of all the earth Thou art;

Dear Desire of every nation,

Joy of every longing heart.

Born Thy people to deliver,

Born a child and yet a King,

Born to reign in us forever,

Now Thy gracious kingdom bring.

By Thine own eternal Spirit

Rule in all our hearts alone;

By Thine all sufficient merit,

Raise us to Thy glorious throne.

-Charles Wesley