After reading something earlier it reminded me of an incident that happened several years ago. I can't say it crosses my mind a lot but maybe it should. I do think of it each Christmas and wonder. Wonder where my friends have gone.

It was the beginning of December of 1998. My fiancée and I had tied the knot finally after 5 years, we were 6 months into our marriage. His father's family had invited us to there yearly Christmas party in Utah, outside Salt Lake. We had already left our house and was heading for the freeway when, as usual we realized something had been forgotten, an turned around. When we were heading back out my husband's ex friend showed up at the door, we both told him to leave and did not mention our trip to him. Utah was awesome, they received 15 inches of snow the night before. It was picture perfect, all of it.

That was the end of the perfection for several days. We walked into a house with dirty dishes everywhere, most of our food gone, cigarette butts everywhere (we did not smoke in the house). I will not describe the disgust left in the bathroom or the garage. He had slept in our bed, and worn my husbands clothes. Apparently a mutual friend of my husband's had let slip that we were going to be out of town for four days. His former friend, who had greeted us at the door when we were leaving, had broke into the house and stayed there while we were gone. It wasn't until I hit the ATM machine that I realized the full extent of the damage. He had taken my ATM card the night before and withdrew the daily limit. All of the money we had for Christmas and the bills, food etc. I lost it at that point. Not only had this prick violated my sense of security by breaking into my home, he had taken food and Christmas from my family. Over the next several days we put all the pieces together of what had happened, had all of our ATM cards destroyed and reissued with new PIN numbers, and borrowed what we could to meet our monthly obligations. Christmas was going to be bleak. We couldn't even afford a tree. Luckily we only had a little left to pay on the couple items we had in layaway for our son, so there were at least a few things that he would get. But no tree? No food? I had been looking forward to baking things with my son (not to mention just having money for dinner). Decorating a tree. Vacuuming pine needles for days. To me it's not Christmas until your house smells like pine and you have tinsel stuck to your clothes. I wouldn't be able to buy a thing for my husband, or he anything for me. We would get thru it somehow. It was only one Christmas. Yet I kept thinking it was the only Christmas our son would have when he was 5. He would be old enough to remember this as an adult. I wanted so much to instill the wonder of the season in him because I firmly believe it's something you learn as a child. Little did I know how much he would learn.

Several days later a mutual friend and my husbands co worker showed up at the door with bags and bags of groceries. She had heard about what happened, what he had done. God was I grateful for the food. Then this funny thing called pride popped up and I tried telling her that we would be fine. She knew better and ignored me (Thank you Barb, wherever you are). Later on the same day a friend of mine asked me to help him shop for groceries. He was very excited that he would have his children home for Christmas but was stumped on what to buy and how to make the money stretch for there stay. After going shopping with him we stopped by a Christmas tree lot. My son got very excited and asked if we were going to finally get a tree. I hushed him. My friend told me to wait in the car, but my son got out and ran after him. I saw him talking to one of the workers. I didn't want this to happen I KNEW what he was doing and up popped that pride again. The man was talking to my son and pointing at a small tree. He started jumping up and down. My friend walked back to the car with the tree and my son absolutely glowing. I asked what he thought he was doing. "Helping a friend, a friend who has helped me out too." I looked at him, I couldn't argue the point. He was right. Besides how could I say no? This wasn't about me, I kept reminding myself. Thank you, Anthony, I miss you.

Now things were looking better. A little more like Christmas. We had a decorated tree, a few presents under it and some damn good friends. Christmas morning I heard the doorbell ringing. 7am, good god who could that be. There was nobody out there. I opened the door to look out but couldn't push the screen open. There was a huge box on the front porch. Puzzled, I hollered for my husband. He brought the box into the living room. Written in red marker on the top was "Merry Christmas from Santa Claus". It was huge microwave box full of boys toys, really nice things. I couldn't think of a single person I knew who would be awake at 7am let alone have the money for this. I got on the phone and woke them all up trying to find out who did this. I wouldn't deny my son the gifts but whoever it was deserved a thank you at least. Hanging the phone up. I turned to say something to my husband and very irritated he said "Nat, let it go. It's from Santa, it doesn't matter ok?" Our son was standing there looking at us both. He said "So there really is a Santa, or was it God? He knew we needed help." That was the best Christmas I remember, ever. And thank you God for sending those angels into our lives. I no longer wonder who it was, just happy that it was. Whoever you are, thank you.