Every holiday season, my family and I celebrate in, well, the typical way of so many Americans — we trade gifts, we give hugs, have a big meal, and then lounge around enjoying a vacation. For millions of Americans, including young children, things aren’t so great for the holidays.
As a young child, though, my Christmas wasn’t always this way. The third child in a family of six, my younger brother with a significant physical disability, and a family with not a lot of resources, I learned a lot about what it would be like in a Christmas where what was under the tree were things we had made for each other, without a lot of big expenses.
Clothes, socks, things we needed were things we traded on Christmas. One year, we wrote each other notes, what we meant to each other. My youngest brother, a student bright enough that he would later go on to win a state Geographic Bee to compete in a national competition, would spin a globe, point to an address, and we would all send Christmas cards and a small gift to someone in that community.
We would wrap and item, addressed to “Postmaster” at an address anywhere in the country, and include a short note for a postmaster: “Please give to a family who needs it”. We didn’t have much, but sharing what little we had, well, it meant a lot.
This Christmas, at our local community college, students hung cards on a tree at the college, of things students with needs anonymously asked for this Christmas. Their asks were small — one community college student asked for $50 food card. Another asked for wool socks. Another asked for a fuel card, gas for their car. Another asked for a pair of shoes — no brand, just a size, anything they could get.
My two boys attend different schools — one for students with special needs, another is in a mainstream high school, embarking on his senior year. While their experiences are different in those environments and their educational goals, I know that they still encounter students who both have families with resources and those that don’t.
Earlier today, I went through some of our family memories from Christmas past, holidays we had enjoyed together as a family. Good times and bad, we had each other. A decade later from “little kids”, I couldn’t tell you what they received for the holidays and what we gave them. It doesn’t really matter. We had each other.
When this meme began to circulate Facebook this morning, I was reminded of what it is like to have very little.
This holiday, share a little bit with someone who needs it. It doesn’t take expensive gifts. Thanks to policies in many of our state houses, a Christmas gift for too many families is a lump of coal — a loss or cut in SNAP, fewer resources for those at risk who struggle paying a heating bill or electric bill.
This video — while done by a German company, is mostly without dialog, and I challenge you to watch it and not think to yourself: when people do better, we do better.
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