Believe in Christmas Magic
To the best of my childhood recollection the first time I believed in Christmas magic happened the night the bells jingled outside our bedroom window.
I was four, maybe five years old.
Walking home from visiting our grandparents on Christmas Eve (they lived around the corner), my parents each carried a bundled-up child while safely guiding my older brother and me around the snow banks.
As we turned onto Summer Street, the falling snow hit us sideways and prickled our cheeks. Mom ‘oohed’ and ‘aahed’ at the neighbors’ pretty light displays that drew squeals from the smaller children as Dad wondered aloud if Rudolph’s nose would help Santa through the ‘terrible’ storm.
My brother took my hand and pulled me along. The snowy blast added to our growing anticipation and concern. We kept a watchful eye to the sky, you know, to see if Santa had passed by.
Arriving home, we rushed up the stairs to change into our pajamas and snuggled straight under the bed covers. I don’t recall ever setting out milk, cookies and carrots. I do remember lying very still in bed, willing myself to sleep, but sleep was not my friend.
Except for the light ticking of snow against the window, all around the house seemed extra quiet and dark.
The faint sound that woke me came from a distance, like trying to wake from a dream. I stirred. Then I heard it again. Louder. Coming towards me. I sat straight up and focused with all my might, like eye squinting but with my ears. First I willed the sound to come again, then begged.
I waited.
And waited.
Nothing.
Then I heard it again.
My old brother leaned in through doorway. “Did you hear it?” he said.
He had heard it too.
We went to the window by his bed where he wiped the fog from the glass. Pressing our noses against it, we looked up to the sky and below to the ground. We listened as hard as possible, barely breathing. Expecting. Hopeful.
Then we heard the jingling bells. Santa’s Bells — clear and musical and beautiful. My mouth hung open; my brother’s too, a pair of wonder-eyed bookends.
If that night is chalked up to a child’s imagination of Christmas, so be it. It’s my memory to hold and cherish. And like many childhood memories the night of the Christmas bells faded.
Until…
My son was five years old. The book was Chris Van Allsburg’s The Polar Express. Published in 1985, it was the hot holiday book of the season and today, a Christmas classic.
Briefly the story is about a skeptical young boy who takes a train ride in the middle of the night to the North Pole. There he is selected by Santa to receive the first gift of Christmas. The boy chooses a bell from one of the reindeer’s harnesses. He places the bell into his bathrobe pocket, which later he learns has been lost through a hole there.
I read to the end of the story, with my son snuggled on my lap, to the part where on Christmas morning the boy opens a gift box from Santa.
Mind you, I’m into this wonderful story, my son is engrossed, too, waiting to hear what is in the gift box.
He and I gasped together.
“It’s the bell!” said my son.
Truthfully, my mouth fell open, all over again.
The boy and his younger sister marvel at the sound. The parents, unable to hear the sound, believe the bell is broken.
The book ends with the following:
“At one time, most of my friends could hear the bell, but as years passed, it fell silent for all of them. Even Sarah found one Christmas that she could no longer hear its sweet sound. Though I’ve grown old, the bell still rings for me, as it does for all who truly believe.”*
May your Christmas be filled with magic.
BE F-G AWESOME TODAY!
Original graphic: Stephanie DelTorchioSource: The Polar Express by Chris Van Allsburg. 1985. Houghton Mifflin.