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Sunny Side Up Dec. 24, 2001 � 2001, by Kathleen Gibson Christmas at the Rich Folks' The entire family, clad in smiles and pajamas, was clustered in the living room. In the corner leaned a scraggly fir, smiling a little itself under construction paper chains, tangled tinsel and thumb-sized crayola-colored lights. The knock came just as the wrappings flew off the last present�a Skipper doll, complete with her own homemade wardrobe, for the seven-year-old middle child, who�d wanted a �Barbie without bumps�. By the time the father waded through the wrappings, pushed aside the arborite coffee table, turned the key under the glass knob and opened the door, no one was waiting. He stepped onto the porch, looked down the gravel driveway to the road beyond. A lone car was passing, but it wasn�t familiar, and the driver didn�t glance back. The father turned to go in the house, but the children�almost too many to count, pressed around him, pointing excitedly. �Look Daddy, they left something!� �What have we here?� Puzzled, the man lifted the large unmarked box, carried it into the house and set it gingerly on the worn wood print linoleum. The children pushed in for a closer look. The box was bulging with food�a plump turkey, a bottle of wine, tinned vegetables, cheese, chocolates, oranges, and another box�labeled Bick�s Pickles�that held three round jars of gherkins. The man was speechless, but the children laughed till tears ran down their faces, till they collapsed into the pile of torn wrappings, till the mother told them to calm down, and what was so funny about a box of food anyway? They reminded her then, that their school had been collecting hampers for poor people, hampers just like this one, how they themselves had brought tins of tomato soup for those very hampers. �Someone got us mixed up with the poor people,� they gasped between giggles. �They think we�re poor, they think we�re poor. And we�re really rich!� They ran around the room chanting it. �We�re rich, we�re rich�we�re really rich!� The parents smiled, agreed that it was indeed funny, but since there was no name on the box, and no way to return the groceries, why not thank God and enjoy them? So the mother, whistling, opened the oranges for everyone to share, put the chocolate box on the piano, cooked the turkey, and stored the rest of the food in the pantry. But the seven-year old asked for the pickle box to store Skipper and all her clothes in. It was years before that child understood that the hamper really was meant for her family, that it was very needed, and that somehow her parents had managed to combine a janitor�s income with the precise amount of faith and love needed to make a home full of children�natural, adopted, foster, handicapped, abandoned�seem like a very comfortable upbringing indeed. The rich little poor girl is a mother of adult children now. Skipper still lives in the Bick�s Pickle box in her closet. I�ll show her to you anytime. You can respond to this column at [email protected] |
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