Share a Memorable Christmas Story with LIVE! Readers

A Sneak-a-Peek Christmas

On a day like this many years ago, when I was about nine years old, my older sister and I waited in anticipation for our mother to leave. Not because we disliked her presence, but because we were at the age of knowledge—the knowledge that Santa Claus was simply another fairy tale. After all, how could he come down a chimney we didn’t have?

That was the benefit of having two older sisters. I learned early Santa Claus was simply great to watch on television in our world of make believe.

For us, Santa Claus was the woman we wanted to leave our house so we could scourge her closet to peek at what she bought us. My oldest sister had outgrown such childish antics, so she was nowhere to be seen, and we decided to allow our little brother to believe in Santa a little longer.

Yes, we realized that took the surprise and joy out of waiting, but Tanya and I didn’t care for surprises when it came to Christmas. We preferred to act surprised on Christmas Eve, after the family ate big fat Arizona tamales with thick red chile meat and black olives, homemade beans, ham, and splurged on all the baked goods we spent hours and days baking. My personal favorites were, and still are, Buckeye Balls (cookies that look like eyeballs but taste like Reese’s Butter Cups) and my mom’s homemade caramel corn. If my grandparents happened to travel from Winslow to Phoenix, or us to Winslow, then I would add my grandma’s biscochitos and empanadas to the mix.

Anyways, back to our scheme. Earlier that day, we both agreed one of us would do the peeking, while the other would watch out for our mom’s return.

Of course, it had to be my bossy older sister who did the peeking. She always had to run the show. She said “we had to be careful” going through the bags hidden behind clothes, shoes, and other things my mom found to hide gifts from our prying eyes. Obviously, that didn’t work.

After Tanya did her peeking, she came out of the closet with a smug smile on her face and a gleam in those brown eyes.

“Well?” I asked.

“Well what?” she responded sarcastically.

“What did we get?”

“I better not say-“

“Tanya!” I yelled.

She laughed. “Just kidding. You’re getting what you wanted, and so am I.”

We looked at each other and smiled.

“I knew it!” I said.

That night, as I looked up at the top bunk that my sister Tanya slept on, I felt overwhelmed with guilt. I always felt that way after we peeked in our mom’s closet, but I hated waiting so long for the big day. The anticipation of waiting always made my tummy clench and my palms sweat.

Luckily for me, the excitement of my newfound knowledge overrode my guilt. I couldn’t wait until Christmas Eve! I wanted so badly to try out my new record player and records she got with it. Previously, when I saw it at the store, I knew there was no way I would get it because it cost too much. My mom didn’t have a lot of money, so we knew better than to ask. But on Christmas, we always somehow got we wished for. Our Santa never let us down.

With my thoughts on my loving Santa, I dreamed of music that night.

A few days later, the presents went wrapped under the tree. Shortly after that, everyone came to our house on Christmas Eve, and when the time came for us to open gifts close to midnight, I oohed and awed at the lip gloss, polish, clothes, crochet items from my grandma, and other gifts given by our many family members. When the time finally came for the big one, I opened the big box with anticipation, despite my previous knowledge.

I shrieked with joy when I saw the record player and all that came with it. To hide the guilt in my eyes, I ran to my mom and gave her a big hug. She hugged me back and rubbed my hair.

“You’re welcome,” she said.

With that, the guilt melted away, and then came the gratefulness. Despite not having much, my mom made our Christmas awesome once more. Not only that, but we didn’t get caught for sneaking through her closet. My mom was awesome, but nothing could save us from that 5-feet-of-hell-on-heels when she was angry.

To be continued with another story….

Write a LIVE! Christmas Story

So right about now, you may be wondering, “What’s with this story, and what story comes next?”

Well, this trip down memory lane is a way to kick off our LIVE! Christmas Story fun. From now through next week, we will be accepting short Christmas stories like this one from our readers; and, beginning Monday, we will publish these stories on our site. We will do so through Christmas Eve, so if you have a fun story/memory you would like to share, please type it on a Word document (2000 and above) and email it to [email protected].

We look forward to reading your favorite Christmas memories.