This is a reprint of a story I wrote that appeared in last year's Chicken Soup for the Soul's Christmas anthology:
“Mom! I made an angel for the top of our Christmas
tree!”
My five-year-old daughter exclaimed these words as she
excitedly pulled the treasure she'd made in her kindergarten class from her
backpack. Then she held it up for me to admire.
It consisted of a six-inch cardboard cone spray-painted
gold, very much resembling a metallic gold, upside-down ice cream cone. To that
base she had glued white pipe cleaners on the sides and bent them so that they
came together in front. There they were also glued to a small rectangle paper
so as to appear to be holding sheet music. In the back, she’d glued a lacy
doily which I assumed were wings.
Up to that point is wasn’t so bad but its head looked like
something out of a science fiction movie--a rather large white Styrofoam
ball in which my sweet daughter had stuck large, colorful pins to make its
facial features. She stuck the ones for eyes through small, round metallic
gold papers. The papers were not glued down, and thus did not rest against the
round Styrofoam ball. They sort of stuck out all around the pin eyeballs,
looking a bit more like fins than eyes. This caused the angel’s eyes to look sort of like insect eyes.
It’s hair was a series of yellow pipe cleaners that had been
cut short and individually stuck in the head. They were bent so they hung down
rather than sticking straight out, thank goodness. It’s halo was another yellow
pipe cleaner that had been stuck in the very top of the Styrofoam head and
then bent into a circle around it. Since she had used the same pipe cleaners as
the hair, it sort of looked like one piece of hair had gotten wind-blown and
messed up. I had to fight the urge to smooth it down along with the other hair.
But my daughter was so proud! What’s a mother to do?
Of course, I told her the strange-looking thing she held in
her hand was beautiful and I climbed on a chair and placed it on the top of my
tree.
… and there it remained, or was placed again, rather, year
after year after year. It peered down on us Christmas after Christmas looking more like a space alien with its metallic, bulging eyes, than an angel. And
every year, as I placed it on the tree, I tried to assess my daughter’s level
of attachment to it, always hoping we could finally laugh at it and declare it
for what it was—a five-year-old’s funny attempt at making an angel. But each
year my daughter smiled and admired it when it came out of the Christmas box.
Many times, she excitedly placed it in my hand and exclaimed, “My angel! Here
Mommy, put her on top of the tree.” (I suppose the angel was a her. It was hard
to tell but my daughter seemed to think it was.)
One of the years when my daughter was in middle school, as I
was taking the angel out of the box of decorations, its head fell off
and rolled onto the family room floor. I jumped at the opportunity, quickly
suggesting that perhaps it was time to get a new angel for our tree.
My daughter’s face fell.
Even though she was close to being a teenager, she still held affection for
this strange item that bordered on being a monstrosity. “Or… I could try gluing
the head back on and see if it stays,” I quickly suggested. This pleased my
daughter so her angel once again graced our tree … for many more years.
I was beginning to wonder if I would have to have that bug-eyed
thing topping my tree forever! I would see beautiful trees in stores and
magazines and other people’s houses, but not mine. Mine was forever doomed to
be a tree decorated with homemade ornaments my three sons and one daughter had brought
home to me through the years. And it would forever have this insect-like alien
with messed up hair sitting on top of it!
I resigned myself to it. It appeared inevitable.
Then one Christmas morning when my daughter was in high
school, she handed me the gift she had bought me. I opened it and there before
my eyes was a beautiful, elegant, store-bought angel tree-topper! I have never
been so happy to receive a gift in my life! She and the whole family burst out
laughing when they saw how happy I was.
Today, my tree is a mix of homemade ornaments and purchased
ones. But sitting on the very top is a lovely angel holding tiny candles that
light up who has normal looking hair and eyes and an elegant halo. It looks
down at us in a gentle, smiling sort of way, instead of leering at us through
bulging eyes.
And the other, much loved angel of days gone by rests in the
bottom of the decoration box in two parts—body and head—because her head came
off again. Every year I look at it and laugh … but I think I miss it a little. I
love her too much to throw her away. She is a treasure in her own way.
My daughter is grown now with a child of her own. One year,
I offered to glue her angel’s head back on and let her use it or her Christmas
tree. We both burst out laughing.
