The Christmas Letters by Bret Nicholaus Page B

Whether or not you truly care about what I have to say doesn't matter; it's the fact that you willingly take the time to let me share my life's experiences.”
    My uncle smiled across the table. I, for one, knew that his ongoing interest in Grandpa's stories was sincere. On many occasions he had even encouraged Grandpa to write down the stories for the sake of posterity, but Grandpa had never followed through on it.
    T URNING TO OUR YOUNG DAUGHTER , his only great-grandchild, he said, “The letter I that you have is for Imagination—something that you possess so abundantly, and something that I wish we all had more of. To an old man of nearly eighty-six years, your imagination is more refreshing than any words could ever describe. What I wouldn't give to see life through the eyes of a child again, especially at Christmas…what an incredibly magical time of the year! I hope that you never lose that childlike wonderment—and always remember how much it meant to me.”
    “What does
imagination
mean?” our daughter inquired. All of us around the table chuckled at the innocence of her question.
    A DDRESSING HIS OWN DAUGHTER , he explained why the letter S belonged to her. “The S is for Solo,” he said.
    Every year since she was sixteen, my aunt has sung a solo at the midnight service at church on Christmas Eve. Grandpa explained that each year her beautiful voice would bring tears to his eyes as he sat with Grandma in the back of the balcony and listened to her sing. Grandpa—a man who rarely verbalized his deepest feelings for his children—had never shared this with her before, and I could tell that my aunt was overcome with happiness.
    I HELD THE T AND I WAS NEXT .
    “The T is for Train,” he said to me. The word was not even out of his mouth when it struck me: Every year, under our Christmas tree, I place an old metal train on some rusty tracks—Grandpa's train from when he was a young boy. He was the son of immigrant parents, and it was the first real Christmas gift his dad had been able to buy for him. Grandpa had given the train to my dad when he turned six years old, and my dad had given it to me when I reached the same age. Knowing that someone still cared about that train—still placed under a tree after eight decades—was so significant to him.
    Yet I had never given any serious thought to its emotional value; for me, it had simply been something to fill space under the bottom row of pine boughs.
    Whether or not he meant to do it, Grandpa was delivering a lesson worth remembering: It's the little things in life that often mean the most.
    L OOKING AT MY TWENTY-EIGHT-YEAR-OLD sister, he said, “M is for Mistletoe—yes, mistletoe. It's no secret that nobody wants to go out of their way to give a kiss to a wrinkled, elderly man—I sure wouldn't if I were you! And yet you do it every single year. You catch me standing under that mistletoe hanging in the archway of the front door, and then you always run over to give Grandpa a Christmas kiss on the cheek. I love you so much for that.”
    My sister had that mixed look of being both slightly embarrassed and highly flattered at the same time.
    M Y DAD HAD THE A. I was pretty certain that I knew what his letter stood for, but I held back the urge to speak my thoughts. The stage that night belonged to Grandpa.
    “The A is for Angel. Even after all these years and the fact that you've got a wonderful family of your own, you still let me put the angel in place at the top of your tree. Remember the year that mom and I couldn't be there for the tree-trimming party? You kept the angel off the top until two nights later, when we could finally get to your house. Your willingness to let me have an important part in that annual event is something that has always meant a lot to me.”
    “It has always meant a lot to us, too,” my dad answered. “It just wouldn't be the same if you didn't top-off the tree.”
    T URNING TO MY MOM , his daughter-in-law and hostess for the