(HOST) Today has its special memories for all of us. Here’s one that rekindled the Christmas spirit for commentator Tom Slayton.
(SLAYTON) I have to admit it: lately I have been Christmas-challenged. I used to love the holiday – but lately, the relentless demand for cheeriness in the face of the obvious misery of much of the world can depress me. The rituals I once liked — even the sound of Christmas music – now sometimes feel predictable, oppressive, grating.
Nevertheless, the women in our lives cannot be denied. And so, not long ago, I was helping Elizabeth, my wife, get out the Christmas decorations. She asked me to get the red wooden push-sled down from the attic. And then she got out sandpaper and red paint. She was actually going to repaint it!
"Why?" I asked.
To understand the significance of what happened next, you have to understand that the woman I married, is a tough Lyndonville cookie. She never cries. For anything.
But when I looked at her after my question, I saw, amazingly, that she had tears in her eyes!
"My grandpa made it for me…" she said, with a quaver.
I knew, of course, why the sled was important to her. Her grandfather, Augustus Wilson, had made the little red sled in 1945 for the new baby girl who would become my Elizabeth.
Grandparents – especially gentle, capable grandparents who obviously love you – are important to their grandchildren. And Grandpa Augustus was, though very humble, a remarkable man. He had been born in England, but had been taken away from his very poor family, and shipped to Canada as a "home boy." Awful as it seems to us today, the British government simply took this little seven-year-old boy and sent him on a boat to Canada, to help settle rural areas of that country. He was lodged with two maiden ladies in rural Quebec, who used the Bible to teach him to read, and brought him up as though he were their own son.
He worked most of his life for the railroad in Lyndonville. And when he knew that he would have a grand-daughter, he made her a little red sled with a push-handle, sort of like a baby carriage with runners – just right for a northern Vermont winter.
Elizabeth’s mom and dad pushed her through the snowy Lyndonville streets in the little sled. There’s a family photograph with her bundled up in it.
I never met grandpa Augustus. He died suddenly when Elizabeth was just a little girl. By the time we met and were married, all she had of him were photographs and memories.
And the little red sled, which she kept stored away, along with the high chair and crib he had also made for her as a baby. Eventually, the crib and the high chair were used for our son, Ethan. And as a baby he, too, got pushed along snowy streets in the little red sled.
And so now, this Christmastime, it sits, fresh-painted red and bedecked with lights and greenery, on our front porch. A piece of our family history, a bit of our hearts today, a remembrance for a good man who loved his granddaughter a lot and showed his love in the best way he knew how.
And a reminder for the family Scrooge – yours truly – about the real value of Christmas.
Tom Slayton is editor-emeritus of Vermont Life magazine.